Bowling Green State University Athletics
Falcons Head to Detroit Wednesday
November 29, 2005 | Women's Basketball
Nov. 29, 2005
Complete Release & Statistics (17 pages) in PDF Format
Download Free Acrobat Reader
BOWLING GREEN, Ohio -
GAME #5
BGSU at DETROIT
Wed., November 30, 2005
7:00 p.m.
Calihan Hall (8,295)
Detroit, Mich.
RADIO: WBGU-FM (88.1) - Chris Schieman and Dave Pecilunas
SERIES: UDM leads, 10-7
LAST MEETING: at BGSU 77, Detroit 53 (Nov. 25, 2003)
The Bowling Green State University women's basketball team, after posting one of the biggest non-conference road wins of the last few years, takes to the road once again to close the November schedule ... the Falcons of head coach Curt Miller will head to the Motor City to face the University of Detroit Mercy ... tipoff is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. at Calihan Hall (8,295).
HONEGGER, FALCONS WIN HAMPTON INN CLASSIC
Junior Liz Honegger, the lone Indiana native on the Falcons' 2005-06 roster, was named the tournament MVP as BGSU won the Hampton Inn Classic over the weekend ... Honegger, a native of Lafayette, Ind., averaged 18.5 points, 6.0 rebounds and 2.5 blocked shots in wins over IUPUI (66-55; Nov. 25) and host Indiana (68-50; Nov. 26) ... she had a BGSU season-high 25 points in the first-round win over the Jaguars, including 18 in the first half ... the next night, vs. the Hoosiers, Honegger had 12 points, hitting four three-point field goals in a four-minute span in the second half ... she scored 12 consecutive BG points during that stretch, as the Falcons built the lead from five to 15 points ... junior Carin Horne and sophomore Kate Achter joined Honegger on the Hampton Inn Classic's all-tourney team.
FIRST TOURNAMENT TITLE IN 16 YEARS
The Falcons' championship at the Hampton Inn Classic marked BGSU's first title in an in-season tournament in nearly 16 years ... BG's last tourney title came in the Illini Classic (Dec. 2-3, 1988), when the Brown and Orange downed Villanova and Iowa State to capture that title ... it should be noted, however, that BGSU has won the MAC Tournament title four times in that span, including in 2005.
FOUR-AND-OH FALCONS
The Falcons are off to a 4-0 start this season, BG's best in 14 years ... the 1991-92 team began the year with five consecutive victories en route to a 24-5 record ... the school record for consecutive wins to start a season is six, set in the 1974-75 campaign and matched in 1988-89.
HONEGGER NAMED MAC PLAYER OF THE WEEK
In addition to her Hampton Inn Classic MVP award, junior Liz Honegger also has been named the MAC's Player of the Week, the league office announced late Monday night (Nov. 28) ... Honegger earns the MAC honor for the first time this season and the fifth time in her Falcon career.
(IN-SEASON) TOURNEY TIME
As mentioned, it had been quite a while - nearly 16 years - since the Falcons had won a regular-season tournament ... BGSU's 2-0 record at IU was the Falcons' first since the EKU Comfort Suites Classic two years ago (Dec. 29-30, 2003), when the team picked up wins over host Eastern Kentucky and Morehead State ... that classic featured predetermined matchups on each day, however, with Georgia, the fourth team in the classic, matching the Falcons' 2-0 mark ... since the Illini Classic, BGSU teams had gone 1-1 in 18 different in-season tournaments, 2-1 in one and 0-2 three times, in addition to the 2-0 record at EKU.
THE DEFENSE NEVER RESTS
BGSU has held each of the season's first four opponents to 55 points or fewer ... the Falcons have limited those four foes to a combined field-goal percentage of 35.3 percent and an average of just 52.5 points per game ... no BG opponent has scored more than 50 points to date.
HONEGGER AT HOME IN HOOSIER STATE
Junior Liz Honegger has experienced a great deal of success in the Falcons' last three trips to her home state ... Honegger, as mentioned a native of Lafayette, Ind., has posted the three highest-scoring totals of her career in the team's last three visits to the state of Indiana ... she scored a career-high 27 points in BGSU's win at IPFW last season (Nov. 19, 2004), then matched that total in the Falcons' victory at Ball State (Feb. 8, 2005) ... her 25-point game Friday (Nov. 25) marked the third time in her career - all in Indiana - that Honegger had scored at least 25 points in a game.
ABOUT THE FALCONS
Bowling Green heads to Detroit with a 4-0 record on the young season ... the Falcons opened the year with 78-50 win over IPFW (Nov. 18), and followed that with a 77-55 victory against Saint Francis (Pa.) three days later (Nov. 21) ... then, BG went to Bloomington, Ind., and won the Hampton Inn Classic with wins over IUPUI (66-55; Nov. 25) and host Indiana (68-50; Nov. 26) ... head coach Curt Miller and his staff returned nine letterwinners, including all five starters, from last year's MAC Championship team ... the 2004-05 Falcons finished 23-8 overall and 13-3 in league play, winning the West Division title and earning the number-one seed for the Kraft MAC Tournament ... then, Miller's team picked up three wins to earn the league tourney title ... senior Casey McDowell, juniors Liz Honegger, Carin Horne and Ali Mann and sophomore Kate Achter are the returning starters ... each of the five earned some sort of MAC honor in 2004-05 ... Honegger and Mann each were named to the All-MAC Second Team, while Horne earned honorable mention and Achter was named to the MAC's All-Freshman Team ... Achter was named the MAC Tournament MVP, with Honegger and McDowell joining her on the all-tournament team ... other returning letterwinners include senior Jill Lause, juniors Amber Flynn and Megan Thorburn and sophomore Whitney Taylor ... Honegger is averaging a team-best 15.0 points per game, and also leads the Falcons with seven blocked shots and 10 three-point field goals made ... she has 5.0 rebounds per contest ... Mann is averaging 13.0 points and a BG-best 8.8 rebounds, while Horne and Achter have 11.0 points per game each ... Horne has a team-high 3.3 steals per game, while Achter leads the team with 6.3 assists per outing ... Flynn is averaging 8.3 points and 6.3 boards off the bench ... the Falcons are shooting 42.7 percent from the field, while holding opponents to just a 35.3% success rate to date.
THE MIGHTY FLYNN
All during the offseason, Falcon head coach Curt Miller told anyone who would listen that junior Amber Flynn had made perhaps as much improvement as anyone on the team ... in the early portion of the season, Flynn has shown that maybe, just maybe, her coach knows what he is talking about ... Flynn had a career-high 13 points in BG's win over IPFW, and tied her career best with four rebounds and a steal ... in fact, she has grabbed at least four boards in each of this year's four games ... Flynn had seven points and seven caroms in the win over SFU ... she had four points and four boards vs. IUPUI, and nearly had a double-double against Indiana, with nine points and a career-best 10 rebounds ... Flynn is now averaging 8.3 points and 6.3 rebounds per game ... her game-by-game totals to date ...
Amber Flynn - GAME-BY-GAME IN 2005-06
Opponent Pts. Reb. Blk. Stl. Min. IPFW 13 4 0 1 17 Saint Francis 7 7 1 1 17 vs. IUPUI 4 4 1 2 12 at Indiana 9 10 2 2 20
FLYNN SETTING STANDARDS
By BG's third game of the year, junior Amber Flynn already had surpassed her scoring total for each of her first two seasons at BGSU ... Flynn scored 20 points as a freshman, averaging 1.8 points per game ... she had 20 points again last year, averaging 1.1 ppg (18 games played) ... this year, Flynn has 33 points through four games.
PACK THOSE BAGS (AND KEEP 'EM PACKED)
The Falcons are in a stretch which will see the team play three consecutive games, and eight of the next nine contests, away from home ... BGSU's game vs. Duquesne (Dec. 6) is the Falcons' lone home action of the month of December ... then, the Falcons will be away from the friendly confines of venerable Anderson Arena for over a month, until the MAC opener vs. Akron on Jan. 7, 2006.
SISTER ACT
Junior Liz Honegger, as mentioned earlier, is a native of Lafayette, Ind. ... her older sister, Rachael, played basketball at IU, earning four letters from 1997-2001 ... Rachael Honegger scored a total of 667 points, and also had 413 rebounds, 237 assists and 179 steals in her career ... she started 71 career games for the Hoosiers.
MILESTONES
Several Falcons reached career milestones over the weekend ... junior Liz Honegger hit the 100th three-point field goal of her BG tenure in the win over IUPUI ... after draining four more triples in the victory vs. Indiana, Honegger now has 104 successful three-pointers as a Falcon ... classmate Ali Mann surpassed the 500-rebound total in the IUPUI game, and now has a career total of 510 boards ... Honegger grabbed her 500th rebound on Saturday, and has 504 rebounds to date.
THE FALCON 500
The Falcons' win over IPFW (Nov. 18) was the 500th victory in the history of the program ... BGSU enters the Detroit game with an all-time record of 503-338 (.598) ... among current league schools, the Falcons became just the second to reach the 500-victory plateau (according to the MAC media guide) ... Northern Illinois picked up win number 508 on the same night BG got victory number 500, while Toledo earned the 500th win in that program's history two days after BG ... NIU currently has 508 wins and UT 501 ... the 2005-06 season marks the Falcons' 33rd as a varsity program.
SCOUTING DETROIT
Detroit enters Wednesday's BGSU game with an overall record of 1-3 ... the Titans opened the season with a 75-72 home win over Western Carolina (Nov. 18), but dropped three consecutive games on the road ... UDM lost by only two points at Kansas (68-70; Nov. 22), between losses at Kansas State (55-91; Nov. 20) and Cincinnati (55-71; Nov. 26) ... senior guard Lindsey Pasquinzo is averaging a team-best 14.3 points per game, while sophomore guard Shawanna Stubblefield has 10.8 points per contest ... senior forward Joanna Cooper (5.5 ppg), senior guard Katie Solner (6.0 ppg) and junior forward Lauren Yurgens (3.0 ppg) round out the probable starting lineup for head coach Mickey Barrett ... the UDM roster features 13 Michigan natives, including five from within the city limits ... Barrett welcomed back nine letterwinners, from last year's 9-20 team that finished with a Horizon League mark of 5-11 ... Barrett is 25-37 in his third year as a collegiate head coach, all with the Titans ... the school's athletics web site is www.detroittitans.com.
THE SERIES
The Falcons trail Detroit, 10-7, in the all-time series between the teams, and BGSU is 2-6 in road games vs. the Titans ... the Falcons won the last overall meeting, 77-53, in Anderson Arena two years ago (Nov. 25, 2003), breaking a three-game series winning streak for the Titans ... UDM has won the last two meetings at Calihan Hall, including a 67-62 decision in the last meeting there (Nov. 20, 2001), in Curt Miller's second game as BGSU's head coach ... the boxscore from the teams' most recent meeting can be found in the pdf version of these notes.
LAST TIME OUT
The Falcons put together their most complete effort of the young season, and the result was the team's biggest win of the year to date ... BG posted a 68-50 road win over Indiana Saturday night (Nov. 26), in the championship game of IU's Hampton Inn Classic ... the win gives the Falcons a 4-0 record for the first time since the 1991-92 season, and BG's tournament title is the Falcons' first in an in-season tourney in 16 years ... junior Carin Horne led four double-digit scorers with 15 points, while classmate Liz Honegger added 12, all on second-half three-point field goals ... sophomore Kate Achter and junior Ali Mann had 11 and 10 points, respectively ... for the hosts, Cyndi Valentin and Jenny DeMuth combined for 39 of the 50 points, with Valentin scoring a game-high 21 ... the Hoosier's only lead was at 2-0, but the Falcons scored the next nine points ... IU tied the contest late in the opening half, at 26-26, but a Horne jumper concluded the first-half scoring and gave the Falcons a lead they would not relinquish ... Honegger's four triples came within a four-minute span, as she scored 12-straight BG points to build the lead from five to 15 ... IU went on a late 6-0 run to cut BG's lead to nine points, but Mann hit a back-breaking turnaround jumper at the shot-clock buzzer, with 1:45 left, and BG made 9-of-10 free throws over the last minute and a half.
MILLER MAKES HIS MARK IN THE MAC
BGSU head coach Curt Miller's career record currently stands at 69-53, in his fifth year ... over the last two-plus seasons, however, Miller and the Falcons have a record of 48-18 ... BGSU has gone 24-8 in MAC regular-season play over the last two seasons, and 30-9 in all games vs. conference foes during that span (6-1 in league tournament play).
GET A STOP
The Falcons have played some solid defense in the early portion of the season, as evidenced by opponents' 52.5 points-per-game average through four games ... BG has shown the ability to shut the opposing offense down for long stretches ... Friday vs. IUPUI, the Falcons held the Jaguars scoreless for a span of 5:23 in the first half ... the following night vs. Indiana, BG's defense went 5:17 without allowing a point and 7:09 without surrendering a field goal ... during that time, the Falcons increased their lead from two points (30-28) to double digits (40-29).
VOTE OF CONFIDENCE
The Falcons have received votes in each of this year's Associated Press Top 25 polls to date ... BGSU garnered one vote in each of the first two polls, and received two votes in the latest poll, released Monday (Nov. 28).
NON-CONFERENCE SUCCESS
For the third consecutive season, BGSU completed the non-conference portion of the schedule at 7-4 in 2004-05 ... the Falcons had not had three consecutive winning non-league campaigns in over a decade (1991-92 to 1993-94) ... additionally, the Falcons recorded 21 non-league victories over the last three years, tying a school record for a three-year period (BGSU also had 21 such wins from the 1986-87 through 1988-89 seasons) ... BG is the only MAC school to post winning non-league records in each of the last three seasons ... and, of course, BGSU has started the 2005-06 season with a 4-0 record in non-league play.
NON-CONFERENCE SUCCESS II
The Falcons' win over Bucknell last Dec. 30 closed the 2004-05 non-conference season, and extended one of the most successful non-league stretches in school history ... since the start of the 2002-03 season, BGSU is 25-12 in regular-season, non-league games, the most wins of any MAC school ... BG's .676 winning pct. in such games also is the MAC's best.
