The Bucks’ 6-foot-5 guard bent forward until his mouth was right in front of my nose and then exhaled mightily. The blast of garlic hit like a Terrence Dials elbow to the snoot.

The old Italian eatery on Main Street has been a favorite of certain hoops teams, especially Don Donoher’s Dayton clubs and, as Sullinger said: “Coach swears by the place.”

And who’s to argue with Thad Matta?

When it comes to this area — especially UD Arena, where his Ohio State team meets Davidson today in the NCAA tournament — the Bucks’ coach acts like he owns the place.

He put on a one-man show at the Arena as a player one January night in 1988. He was an assistant coach on the Miami University team that upset Arizona in an NCAA tournament game here in 1995.

Then there were those years at Xavier when his teams beat the host Flyers more than Dayton beat them. And in 2004 the Musketeers won four games here in four days at the Atlantic-10 tournament — knocking off No. 1 Saint Joseph’s, then dumping UD in the title game — to make the NCAA tournament and a Cinderella run to the Elite Eight.

Asked about one moment that stands out, Matta smiled: “I’m not gonna lie. My best memory in this building was when we were seven points down with 1:52 to go my sophomore year. I scored the last eight points and won the game with a last-second shot.”

From the way he beamed, you could tell he suddenly was back in a Butler Bulldog uniform against UD:

“I’d hit two 3s and we called time with 19 seconds to go. Coach called us over and I’ll never forget it as long as I live. He draws up a play and says, ‘We’re gonna get the ball to Tucker and if he’s not open, we get it to Folkes. If Folkes isn’t open, we go to Littrell and if not Littrell, then (Karaffa), you get open.’

“I’m sitting in the huddle saying, ‘I’m the one that got us back in the game’ and, ironically, my teammates were smart enough to get me the ball and I got the shot in.”

He talked of his Miami games here on Herb Sendek’s staff, how the Arena was a sea of red and how he hopes Buckeye fans make it a similar experience today.

Regardless of the fans, OSU players think their coach is the secret weapon. Sullinger said Matta has a formula for winning in the NCAA tournament.

Matta laughed: “Yeah, it’s having great players.”

He’s got some now and he’ll get more next season when he brings in a recruiting class considered one of the best ever assembled in college basketball. Matta used that prospect to dispel a rumor he may be lured to Indiana. He claimed he’s not interested and even if he were, “I love my family and know if I left, I’d be going solo.”

He said he never really understood “the power and magnitude of being at Ohio State,” until he got there.

Even so, there was a slight power fade at Dominic’s.

He got the same waitress who’s served him the last five or six times he’s been in, but she thought he was still at Xavier:

“She didn’t know I was at Ohio State, so it was a little bit of a shock to her But she knows now. She goes, ‘I bleed scarlet and gray.’ ”

And the coach, he breathes garlic.

The power is back.