Bowling Green State University
MARSHALL
BGSU Tops Marshall, 73-62, in Battle of Division Leaders
February 23, 2005 | Women's Basketball
Feb. 23, 2005
BOWLING GREEN, Ohio - Freshman Kate Achter scored a career-high 27 points, and sophomores Ali Mann and Liz Honegger each had double-doubles as the Bowling Green State University women's basketball team picked up a 73-62 win over visiting Marshall University Wednesday night (Feb. 23) at venerable Anderson Arena.
With the win, the Falcons improve to 18-7 overall and 11-3 in Mid-American Conference play. BGSU remains in first place in the MAC's West Division, a game ahead of Eastern Michigan. Marshall falls to 17-8 and 11-3, respectively, and the Falcons' win ended a 12-game winning streak for the Thundering Herd.
The win also means that BGSU controls its own destiny in the race for a division title and the number-one seed for the Kraft MAC Tournament. The Falcons and Thundering Herd each have 11-3 league marks, tied for the MAC's best, but BG now wins the tiebreaker by virtue of Wednesday night's victory.
Mann had 19 points and tied her career high with 16 rebounds, as the Falcons held a 48-33 margin on the boards. BGSU had a whopping 22 offensive rebounds to MU's 11.
Honegger had 17 points and 11 rebounds, including an eye-popping nine offensive boards.
Sikeetha Shepard-Hall led the Herd with 16 points, while Teyonka Hodge scored 14 off the bench. Kim Griffin rounded out the double-digit scorers with 11 points in the game.
The Falcons got off to a solid start, scoring the game's first five points, and BG led for the entire first half. Achter opened the game with a driving layup just 12 seconds into the contest, and Mann took a pass from junior Casey McDowell and hit a three-pointer. That trey, however, would be the Falcons' only three-ball of the night, as BG missed the next 16 attempts from beyond the arc.
KaShawna Curry got the Herd on the scoreboard with a foul-line jumper, but a Mann free throw was followed by an Achter layup.
Honegger freed herself for back-to-back wide-open layups, bookending the first media timeout, and the Falcons had a 12-2 lead at the 15:25 mark.
Curry and Shepard-Hall scored to cut the lead to six points, but an Achter layup, off of sophomore Megan Thorburn's second assist in just over a minute, put BG back up by eight.
Minutes later, two of BGSU's seniors teamed up for a hoop, as Tene Lewis made a nifty pass to a cutting Kelly Kapferer. The Falcons scored a second-straight layup on the fastbreak, as sophomore Carin Horne picked the pocket of an MU player and found Achter for a layup. BG led, 22-12, as Marshall took a timeout with 8:45 left in the half.
The Herd cut the lead to six points, at 24-18, but the Falcons upped the lead to 11 points again, as Honegger converted a three-point play. BG led, 29-18, with 4:45 left in the half.
The Herd, however, made a late first-half run, outscoring the Falcons by a 9-2 count before a Honegger free throw with 50 seconds left gave the Brown and Orange a 32-27 lead at the intermission.
In that first half, Honegger had 10 points and seven boards, while Mann scored nine points and grabbed six caroms. Achter, despite missing much of the first half with two fouls, had eight points in the opening half.
The Herd came out of the lockerroom with guns blazing, scoring the first four points to cut the BG lead to 32-31. MU forced a BG turnover on the opening possession, and Shepard-Hall worked inside for a short jumper. Then, after a BG miss, Reshundra Smilty hit a layup on the break, and the Falcons took an early timeout.
A pair of Achter free throws snapped that run, but the Herd stayed close, and Marshall took the lead for the first time on a Shepard-Hall three-pointer at the 16:37 mark.
On BGSU's ensuing possession, Shepard-Hall made a steal and was fouled by Achter. But, Shepard-Hall was whistled for a technical foul, and Achter converted both charity tosses to give BG the lead with 16:15 left.
The lead changed hands a total of six times over the next four minutes. With 12:38 left, a Mann layup began an 8-0 BG run which gave the Falcons the lead for good. Mann scored the first four points in that run, and Achter's fast-break layup with 10:36 on the clock put the Falcons ahead, 46-39.
MU's Griffin hit a jumper, but Honegger scored four-straight points off a pair of Lewis assists. When Mann hit a jumper off a Honegger pass, the lead was in double digits once again.
Achter's nifty running one-hander in the lane gave BG a 54-43 lead at the eight-minute media timeout, and the freshman hit a pair of charity tosses with t:18 left, putting the Falcons up, 56-43. With that lead still at 13 after an acrobatic driving layup by sophomore Carin Horne led to a three-point play, the Herd began to rally.
MU scored the next seven points, cutting BG's margin to six points with 3:16 left. That run was capped by a Shepard-Hall three-point play.
But, a nice look by Lewis led to an easy layup by Horne with 2:01 left, and the lead was eight points.
Hodge hit a jumper, but Achter responded with a free throw with 1:12 left, and -- after a Marshall miss -- Mann made a pair of tosses 11 seconds later.
After another miss, the Falcons rebounded and Achter was fouled. On the play, the BG freshman was thrown to the ground, and Shepard-Hall was whistled for her second technical of the game with 38.7 seconds left. The MU bench also received a technical foul, leading to a long stay at the free-throw line for Achter.
Achter went a perfect 6-for-6 from the stripe, curing the Falcons a 15-point lead before the Herd closed the game with four-straight points.
Marshall shot 41.1 percent for the game to the Falcons' 35.4% rate. Both teams struggled from three-point range, with the Herd making three treys in 13 tries (23.1%), and BG going just 1-of-17 (5.9% from beyond the arc.
The Falcons made 26 free throws, the team's most in a MAC game this year, with Achter going 13-of-14 from the line. BG's 74.3% free-throw rate (26-of-35) included a 21-of-25 effort (84.0%) in the second half. Marshall went 13-of-21 from the line in the game.
Achter, Mann and Honegger combined to score 63 of BG's 73 points, with Horne scoring eight and Kapferer netting the other two. Horne had six rebounds and a game-high five steals.
The Falcons now prepare for a Saturday (Feb. 26) home game vs. the arch-rival University of Toledo. That game begins at 1:00 p.m. at Anderson, and will be preceded by 'Senior Day' festivities. BG's three seniors, Kapferer, Lewis and Sakima Smith, will be recognized.
