Bowling Green State University Athletics
Bowling Green State University
Indiana (Third Round)
Hoosiers Get Past Falcons, 75-67
March 26, 2009 | Women's Basketball
March 26, 2009
Final Stats | BGSU-IU Photo Gallery
• BGSU-Indiana Boxscore in PDF Format
• BGSU's Season Statistics in PDF Format
• THURSDAY'S POSTGAME AUDIO:
IU's Legette-Jack, Jackson and Thomas |
BGSU's Miller |
BGSU's Pontius and Prochaska
BOWLING GREEN, Ohio (BGSUFalcons.com) - Visiting Indiana University got out to an early lead, and the Hoosiers were able to withstand every Bowling Green State University run in a 75-67 victory over the Falcon women's basketball team Thursday night (March 26). The game, a third-round contest in the Women's National Invitation Tournament, was held at venerable Anderson Arena.
With the win, the Hoosiers improve to 21-10 overall, and IU advances to face Illinois State, again on the road, in the quarterfinal round. The Falcons see the season end with a record of 29-5.
BGSU's win total was the second highest in school and Mid-American Conference history. Only the 2006-07 Falcon team, which went 31-4 and advanced to the 'Sweet Sixteen' of the NCAA Championships, had more wins in MAC women's basketball history.
Amber Jackson had 17 points to lead a balanced scoring attack for the Hoosiers. Jamie Braun scored 16 points as five IU players hit double digits in the scoring column.
For the Falcons, sophomore Lauren Prochaska paced four double-figure scorers with a game-high 22 points. Junior Niki McCoy scored 16 points off the bench, while junior Tara Breske and soph Tracy Pontius had 10 points apiece.
The game marked the final collegiate contest for BGSU's lone senior, Lindsey Goldsberry. Goldsberry helped Curt Miller's Falcons to a total of 114 wins in her career, the most victories of any basketball player -- men's or women's -- in MAC history.
The Falcons never led, and the game was tied only once. After a Breske layup tied the game at 2-2 with less than half a minute gone, the Hoosiers scored the next 10 points of the game, holding BG scoreless for a span of 4:41.
BG battled back all game, but could never quite draw even. After falling behind by that 12-2 score, the home team got a McCoy layup and another Breske jumper to draw within six. When Pontius hit a straightaway three-pointer, the Falcons were within five points, at 14-9. But, several minutes later, the Hoosiers' Lindsay Enterline hit a three-pointer of her own, putting her team ahead by a 19-11 score midway through the half.
Prochaska made a layup at the 8:58 mark to cut IU's lead to six points, but five-straight points by the visitors upped that lead to 12 points, at 26-14. Whitney Thomas, who scored 13 points in the game, had four of the five points in that run, sandwiching a pair of buckets around a Whitney Lindsay free throw.
The teams traded baskets for a span of several minutes, as the Hoosiers always seemed to have an answer for every Falcon score. Sophomore Jen Uhl scored at the 4:47 mark, but Jackson hit a jumper at the other end.
Breske scored with 3:13 left, cutting IU's lead to 28-18, but back came the Hoosiers, with Thomas making a layup.
Off of a Pontius inbounds pass, Prochaska hit a triple from the right corner, making it a 30-21 game. But, Braun drilled a three-pointer at the other end, and the visitors' lead was back to 12 points.
Late in the half, BG looked to make a run. Prochaska got to the free-throw line and knocked down a pair of shots with 1:25 on the clock. Then, after a Jori Davis miss and a Breske rebound at the other end, Breske hit a layup to get the Falcons within eight points, 33-25, with a minute left in the half.
Lindsay missed a triple try, with Prochaska getting the rebound. The Falcons got to the line, as Lindsay was whistled for a foul with 27 seconds left. BG missed both free-throw tries, though, and Jackson converted a three-point play with just 7.8 seconds remaining. Instead of potentially trailing by six, the Falcons were 11 points in arrears as the teams headed to the lockerrooms.
In that opening half, the Hoosiers shot 51.6 percent from the field, while holding the Falcons to a 35.7% rate. IU also held a 21-13 rebounding advantage in the half. Those categories would be much more even in the second period.
In the second period, a Davis layup gave IU a 13-point lead, and another hoop by Davis put the visitors up by 14 points, the largest margin of the game, with 15:01 left.
BG worked the ball inside to McCoy for back-to-back layups, cutting IU's advantage to 45-35, but the Falcon junior was knocked to the floor after hitting the second shot. With the visitors on a 5-on-4 break, Jackson hit a layup at the other end. The BG bench was whistled for a technical foul, and Braun split the resulting free throws, putting the Hoosiers back up by 13 points, 48-35.
Pontius responded with a three-pointer, and after Braun split two more charity tosses, Prochaska went to the stripe and hit a pair of shots.
Davis made a jumper with 12:59 left, but Breske cut IU's lead to nine points, 51-42, and Prochaska then nailed a triple off a Pontius pass. The Falcons were within six points, as close as they had been since the first half, with 10:57 remaining.
Four-straight free throws got the IU lead back up to double digits, but Prochaska sliced through traffic for a layup, beginning an 8-0 Falcon run that got the crowd of 2,786 whipped into a frenzy.
The Falcons kept getting the ball to McCoy, and the junior responded. She scored six points in a row, getting to the line twice within 24 seconds and hitting all four free throws. Then, McCoy hit a driving layup, and the Falcons were within just two points, 55-53, with 7:47 remaining in someone's season.
As seemed to be the case all night, however, the Hoosiers had an answer for the Falcon uprising. Davis made a jumper at the other end, giving IU a four-point lead. Then, several minutes later, the visitors would hit a key shot.
That shot came from the hands of Ashlee Mells, an IU reserve who would play just six minutes in the game. Braun drove the lane and kicked the ball to Mells, who was stationed behind the arc at the right elbow. From in front of her team's bench, Mells let fly with a three-pointer that was on target, giving the Hoosiers a 60-53 lead with 6:09 remaining.
Neither team would score for nearly three minutes, before Thomas got an offensive rebound and putback of Braun's miss. That layup gave IU a nine-point lead with 3:18 to go.
The Falcons missed several shots on the next possession, and Braun increased the Hoosiers' advantage to double digits with 2:38 remaining.
A layup by McCoy was followed by Prochaska's three-point play, getting the home team within six points with 1:09 left. Thomas split a pair of free throws, but after she missed the second shot, Kim Roberson grabbed the offensive rebound. Instead of working the clock, however, Roberson attempted a follow-up shot that did not drop. Breske came up with the rebound, and Prochaska was fouled with 52.0 seconds left. Her free throws cut IU's margin to five points, 67-62.
Roberson redeemed herself by making a pair of free thows with 51.1 seconds left, and after a BG miss, two Davis tosses made the score 71-62. Junior Sarah Clapper knocked down a three-pointer with 17.1 ticks on the clock, but the Hoosiers would convert their free-throw tries to salt away the win.
Davis scored 12 points for the Hoosiers, while Roberson had 10, putting all five IU starters in double digits. Thomas had a double-double, with 12 rebounds in addition to her 13 points.
The Falcons shot 41.2% in the second half, for a game rate of 38.7% from the floor. The Hoosiers shot 48.1% for the game, and held an overall rebounding advantage of 39-31. Each team had 18 rebounds in the second half.
Prochaska had her 13th 20-point game of the season, with her game-high 22 points vs. the Hoosiers. The nation's leader in free-throw percentage, she went 10-of-11 from the stripe.
Prochaska, who injured her knee on the final play of Sunday's (March 22) win over Syracuse, was questionable for Thursday's game. And, Pontius was among BG's walking wounded as well, having injured her ankle vs. SU and reaggravated it in practice Wednesday. But, Prochaska played 39 minutes against the Hoosiers, while Pontius saw 38 minutes of action.
For the Falcons, the loss snapped a 19-game home winning streak, which had been tied for the fifth-longest such streak in the country. BGSU finished the season with a school-record 14 wins in 15 outings at Anderson Arena.
The crowd of 2,786 was the eighth-largest in program history for a game at 'The House that Roars.' BGSU had four-digit attendance totals in each of this year's 15 home games, including crowds in excess of 2,000 at seven home games. Each of the last six contests at Anderson saw over 2,000 fans pass through the turnstiles of the venerable building.
As mentioned, the game marked the final contest of Goldsberry's career. It bears repeating that 'Golds' was part of Falcon teams that lost a total of only 20 games in her four years. During her stellar career, BGSU won an average of 28.5 games per season, while losing an average of just 5.0 games per year.
The 2008-09 roster also included four juniors, five sophomores and three freshmen, as well as two NCAA Division-I transfers, Maggie Hennegan (Saint Louis Univ.) and Tamika Nurse (Univ. of Oregon), who sat out the season per NCAA transfer rules.
