Bowling Green State University Athletics
Falcons Host Ohio on Senior Day
March 06, 2009 | Women's Basketball
March 6, 2009
BOWLING GREEN, Ohio (BGSUFalcons.com) -
BGSU vs. OHIO
Saturday, March 7, 2009 • 2:00 p.m.Anderson Arena (3,500) • Bowling Green, Ohio
RECORDS: BGSU 25-3 (14-1 MAC) // Ohio 12-16 (7-8 MAC)
RADIO: WBGU-FM 88.1 - Mike Castellano and Alex Mikos
TELEVISION: BCSN - Todd Hostetler and Mark Ehlen
SERIES: BGSU leads, 44-20 // STREAK: BGSU - 1
LAST MEETING: BGSU 62, at Ohio 52 (Jan. 10, 2009)
BGSU Notes, Stats & Player Bios (49 total pages) in PDF Format
THE GAME
The Bowling Green State University women's basketball team, for the first time in a three-and-a-half-month span, is looking to rebound from a loss ... the Falcons of head coach Curt Miller close the regular-season schedule by hosting Ohio University in 'Senior Day' action Saturday (March 7) afternoon ... tipoff is scheduled for 2:00 p.m. at the most venerable of venues, Anderson Arena (3,500) ... following the Ohio contest, the Brown and Orange will prepare for a quarterfinal-round contest in the Kraft MAC Tournament ... BG will play an opponent to be determined on Friday, March 13, at 11:00 a.m. at Quicken Loans Arena in downtown Cleveland ... BGSU has clinched the East Division title, the school's fifth-straight divisional crown, and the Falcons have assured at least a tie for the best record in the entire conference.
DRIVE FOR FIVE
The Falcons, as mentioned, have clinched a tie for the best record in the MAC ... a BGSU win over Ohio Saturday, or a Ball State loss at Toledo, would give the Falcons the outright conference crown for the fifth consecutive year ... that distinction does not have a bearing on the MAC Tournament (the teams are seeded by division, and BG earned the #1 East seed weeks ago) ... but, by virtue of the Falcons' 76-67 win against BSU on Feb. 3, BG earns the tiebreaker over the Cardinals, and is assured of a berth in a national postseason tourney ... should the Falcons not make the NCAA Championships, BGSU would earn the MAC's automatic bid to the WNIT ... the Falcons will participate in national postseason play for the fifth consecutive year.
NOTE OF THE WEEKEND
GOLDEN NUGGET: LINDSEY IN A CLASS BY HERSELF
Lindsey Goldsberry, the lone senior on the 2008-09 Falcon squad, has experienced success - a lot of success - since her arrival on campus ... the Falcons' win at Buffalo on Feb. 25 made Goldsberry the winningest player - man or woman - in MAC basketball history ... the Falcons have a record of 110-18 since 'Golds' ventured to Northwest Ohio prior to the start of the 2005-06 season ... a few more Goldsberry-related notes ...
• The 'old' MAC record was held by last year's BGSU women's basketball senior class, which consisted of Kate Achter and Whitney Taylor ... that duo helped the Falcons go 108-23 during their careers;
• With one more win, the Falcons will have posted at least 26 wins in each of Goldsberry's four seasons in the Brown and Orange;
• Despite Wednesday's (March 4) loss at Miami, BG is 58-5 in MAC regular-season play and 65-6 against conference opponents (7-1 in the MAC Tournament) during Goldsberry's four years;
• Perhaps the most impressive note? Goldsberry has never lost to seven of the 11 MAC opponents during her career, including Akron (8-0), Buffalo (8-0), Central Michigan (4-0), Eastern Michigan (5-0), Kent State (10-0), Northern Illlinois (5-0) and Toledo (6-0) ... BG's six losses to MAC opponents came vs. Ohio in February of 2007; Miami, Ball State and Western Michigan during a three-game span in January of 2008; OU again in the semifinal round of last year's conference tournament in Cleveland; and MU on Wednesday night in Oxford.
• Goldsberry's Falcon teams have a record of 28-3 in home games vs. MAC opponents, 7-1 in neutral-site contests vs. league foes (all in Cleveland), and a mind-boggling 30-2 mark in road games vs. conference competition ... prior to Wednesday the only MAC road loss of her career had come last season at BSU;
• Goldsberry's former high-school classmate is the winningest manager in MAC hoops history ... Randall Clark, like Goldsberry a graduate of Chaminade-Julienne High School in Dayton, is a senior at BGSU, and is in his fourth year as a student manager with the Falcons.
THE STREAK IS OVER: FALCONS SHATTER SCHOOL RECORD FOR CONSECUTIVE WINS
The Falcons saw their school-record 25-game winning streak snapped Wednesday at Miami ... BG's win over Central Michigan (Feb. 15) broke the old school mark of 21-straight wins, set by Fran Voll's 1986-87 team ... the recently-ended run marked the eighth double-digit win streak in BG annals, and the fourth in as many years ...
BGSU'S LONGEST WINNING STREAKS
Season // Streak // Notes
2008-09 // 25 // BG lost on Nov. 19, then not again until March 4
1986-87 // 21 // Falcons, at 6-2, did not lose again until NCAA Tourney
1988-89 // 20 // Final win came vs. Cincinnati in NCAA first round
1993-94 // 20 // Falcons lost MAC opener, then won out until NCAAs
2005-06 // 19 // Included 16-0 league record and 3 MAC tourney wins
2006-07 // 18 // Part of 24-1 run that took BG all the way to 'Sweet 16'
1992-93 // 17 // BGSU, 8-4, won 14 MAC games, 3 more in MAC Ty.
2007-08 // 10 // Streak spanned all of February and half of March
THESE STREAKS ARE OVER ...
BGSU saw several streaks snapped on Wednesday (March 4) at Miami ... prior to the loss to the RedHawks, BG had won ...
• 25 overall games since a Nov. 19 loss at Valparaiso (the second-longest winning streak in the nation behind only #1 Connecticut);
• 12 consecutive MAC road games; and
• 23-straight overall MAC regular-season games;
... BUT THIS STREAK CONTINUES
Despite that loss in Oxford, the Falcons take some winning streaks into Saturday's game vs. Ohio ... BGSU has won 18-straight games at Anderson Arena, a streak which ranks among the longest in the nation ... the Falcons won the last five contests of 2007-08 at venerable Anderson Arena, and BG has 12-straight home wins in '08-09 ... heading into the weekend, BGSU's homecourt win streak is the seventh-longest in the nation.
MISSED IT BY THAT MUCH
The Falcons fell just one win shy of tying the MAC record for longest winning streak ... BG's 25-game streak is the second-longest in conference history, behind only a 26-game streak put together by Central Michigan in the 1983-84 season.
SECOND ON THIS LIST
BGSU's streak of 23 consecutive MAC regular-season wins also ended on Wednesday ... that streak winds up tied for the second longest, in both school history and in MAC annals ... the Falcons hold the record with 33 consecutive conference wins, from February of 2005 to February of 2007 ... BG holds the top-three spots and four of the top-six places on that list.
STILL PRETTY SUCCESSFUL
Despite the loss to Miami, the Falcons have won 23 of the last 24 MAC regular-season games, and BG has won 34 of the last 37 overall regular-season contests.
LAUREN IN A CLASS (PRETTY MUCH) BY HERSELF
Falcon sophomore Lauren Prochaska scored 25 second-half points in the win over Kent State last Saturday (Feb. 28) ... with two free throws with just 36.4 seconds left in the game, Prochaska reached 1,000 points for her career ... she became the 23rd player in school history to hit the millennium mark, but only the second to do so as a sophomore ... the legendary Jackie Motycka (1985-89) is the only other player to have reached the milestone as a soph, on her way to a school-record 2,122 career points.
A FEW MORE NOTES ABOUT Lauren Prochaska
• Sophomore Lauren Prochaska now has 1,011 points, through just 62 career games ... the Plain City, Ohio, native is averaging 16.3 points per game in her career, a ppg average which would rank her second in school history, behind only Motycka (18.1 ppg).
• Prochaska, not surprisingly, was the second-fastest player to reach 1,000 points, getting there in her 61st career game ... Motycka reached the 1,000-point mark in her 54th career contest at BGSU ... no other player in school history has gotten to that plateau in fewer than 72 games.
• Prochaska's 43 points in the CMU game (Feb. 15) set a new school record ... the next time out, at Akron (Feb. 21), she added 25 more points ... her total of 68 points during that period set a new school record for points in a two-game span.
• She set a school record for consecutive free throws made, sinking 45-straight ... that streak, tied for the seventh-longest in NCAA history, came to an end late in the CMU game ... but, after that miss, Prochaska proceeded to make 33 more free throws in a row, the second-longest streak in BGSU history ... she sank her first 11 tries last Saturday (Feb. 28) vs. Kent State, before missing her final attempt of the day.
• Prochaska continues to lead the entire country in free-throw percentage ... she has shot 94.5% from the stripe this year, making 138-of-146 tries ... in MAC games, her percentage rises to an even more impressive 95.4% ... Prochaska has made 103 free throws in 108 attempts against conference foes this season ... she had made 78 of her last 79 before missing her final toss vs. KSU ... that streak included a 12-for-12 performance at Akron (Feb. 21), tying the school single-game record ... after a miss at Miami, she is 'only' 81 of her last 85.
ABOUT THE FALCONS
• The Falcons are 25-3 on the season, and BGSU is ranked 25th in the nation in both this week's Associated Press (March 2) and USA Today ESPN (March 3) polls ... after opening the year with road losses against Temple and Valparaiso, BGSU won a school-record 25-straight games ... but, that streak ended with a 45-40 loss at Miami Wednesday night (March 4) ... BG won 11 non-conference games for the third consecutive year, then went 5-0 in the first round-robin swing through the MAC's East Division and 6-0 against the West ... the Falcons began the second trip through the East with road wins over Akron and Buffalo ... the latter game saw the Falcons win in overtime for the third time in a span of four road contests ... last Saturday (Feb. 28), the Brown and Orange returned home and downed Kent State, 61-54, at Anderson Arena, before falling at MU.
• The Falcons are 12-0 at home, 11-3 on the road and 2-0 in neutral-site games ... BG won two tournaments, the UNCG Marriott Classic and the Dayton Flyer Classic, during the non-league portion of the schedule ... in between, the Falcons had a 4-0 December homestand, winning the first two games by a combined 63 points over Detroit and Youngstown State, then downing St. Bonaventure and Hartford ... at the Dayton tourney, the Falcons topped Gardner-Webb and the host Flyers to win the title ... BGSU closed the non-league slate and opened the 2009 calendar year with a win at SIU Edwardsville, just prior to the MAC schedule ... senior Lindsey Goldsberry, junior Tara Breske and sophomores Tracy Pontius and Lauren Prochaska each have started all 28 games this season to date ... junior Niki McCoy started the first 21 games of the year, and sophomore Jen Uhl has been in the starting lineup for each of the last seven.
• Prochaska leads the team in scoring, with 18.2 points per game, and is tied for the team rebounding lead, with 6.2 boards per contest ... she has had 11 games of 20 points or more, including a school-record 43-point explosion vs. CMU, and has been named MAC Player of the Week five times this season ... Prochaska leads the nation in free-throw percentage (94.5%; 138-of-146), and is averaging 20.2 ppg in MAC games, over a point per game more than the second-place scorer (Akron's Kara Murphy) ... Pontius is second on the team with 14.4 ppg ... the sophomore, named the MAC P-O-W on Feb. 1, leads the Falcons in assists, with 4.2 per game, and is second in steals (1.5 spg) ... she exploded for 17 points in the overtime period alone at Buffalo, hitting three-pointers on five consecutive trips down the floor ... Pontius leads the entire MAC in assist/turnover ratio (1.90) ... McCoy, who also has been named a MAC P-O-W once this year (Jan. 5), has 12.3 ppg, and ranks third with 5.5 rpg ... she surpassed the 1,000-point mark for her career in the Northern Illinois game on Jan. 31, and had her second double-double of the season at Buffalo ... Breske has scored 7.4 ppg this season to date, while Goldsberry and freshman Jessica Slagle have 5.4 and 5.3 ppg, respectively ... Breske is tied with Prochaska for the BG rebounding lead, with 6.2 rpg ... Breske has averaged 9.4 points and 7.7 boards over the last seven games, including a career-high 14 rebounds at Western Michigan ... Breske also tops BG in blocks (1.2 bpg) ... Goldsberry leads the Falcons in steals (1.9 spg) and is second in assists (2.2 apg) ... she also has an impressive assist/TO ratio of 2.07, but falls shy of the minimum number of assists to qualify for the league leaders ... Uhl has 5.0 points and 4.2 boards per game ... she has averaged 7.9 ppg and 7.1 rpg since moving into the starting lineup, and had a career-high 14 boards at Miami
• The Falcons are shooting 42.8% from the field over the first 28 games ... BG has a three-point FG pct. of 36.1%, with 7.1 triples made per game, and is shooting 79.6% from the free-throw line ... the opponents are shooting 39.0% from the floor, 31.1% from long range and 66.8% from the stripe ... the Falcons have 36.1 rebounds per game to the opponents' 37.6 ... BG has turned the ball over 15.3 times per game, but has forced the opponents into 19.1 per outing.
• The Falcons have made almost twice as many free throws (546) as the opponents (298) ... in fact, BGSU has made 100 more FTs than the foes have attempted (446).
• The Falcons returned a total of nine letterwinners, including three starters, from last season's team ... the group of returnees combined for 65.9 percent of the scoring and 75.0% of the rebounding from last year's 26-8 club ... BGSU won the MAC's regular-season title for the fourth-straight year, posting a 13-3 conference record ... the Falcons advanced to the semifinals of the MAC Tournament before falling in double OT ... Goldsberry, the team's lone senior, is one of the three returning starters from the '07-08 squad ... Breske and Prochaska are the other two.
• Sophs Pontius, Uhl and Chelsea Albert each played in all 34 games last year, with Albert making six starts ... the list of returning letterwinners also includes juniors Laura Bugher and Sarah Clapper and sophomores Kelly Zuercher ... McCoy is in her first playing season with the Falcons ... she sat out the 2007-08 season after transferring from Akron.
• Three freshmen joined the Brown and Orange this year - Maribeth Giese, Slagle and Victoria McGowan ... two other newcomers have come into the Falcon fold ... transfers Maggie Hennegan (Saint Louis Univ.) and Tamika Nurse (Univ. of Oregon) are sitting out the season ... Nurse will have one season of eligibility remaining, while Hennegan will have two.
LAST TIME OUT
For the first time in three-and-a-half months, the BGSU women's basketball team lost a game ... host Miami held the Falcons to just 20 percent shooting in a 45-40 win over the Brown and Orange Wednesday night (March 4) ... the loss snapped BG's school-record 25-game win streak ... the Falcons held the RedHawks to just 28.6 percent shooting from the field on the night ... but, BGSU made a total of only 12 field goals in 60 attempts ... the Falcons were held to season lows in points, assists, field-goal percentage, three-point FG pct. (12.0%; 3-for-25), free-throw pct. (61.9%; 13-of-21) and assists (six) ... BG held Miami to 16 total field goals, tying the season low for a Falcon opponent, and the Falcons held the foe without a three-pointer for the second consecutive game ... trailing by two points with just under four minutes to go, the RedHawks went on a 10-0 run to take a 42-34 lead in the game's final minute ... the Falcons got as close as three points, but two Ashley Hawkins free throws sealed the win for the hosts ... Rachael Hencke scored 13 points while Jenna Schone added 12 for MU ... sophomores Tracy Pontius and Lauren Prochaska had 11 and 10 points, respectively, for the Falcons ... not surprisingly, the Falcons set a season high with 51 rebounds ... soph Jen Uhl led all players with a career-high 14 boards, while Prochaska had eight and junior Tara Breske seven ... BG held a 51-44 advantage on the boards.
SCOUTING OHIO
Ohio enters Saturday's game with a record of 12-16, and the Bobcats will enter Anderson Arena with a mark of 7-8 in MAC play ... Ohio saw a season-high four-game winning streak snapped with Wednesday's 58-57 loss at Akron ... the 'Cats are 6-9 in road games, including a 3-4 mark in MAC games away from home ... individually, senior G/F Lauren Hmiel leads the team in scoring, with 14.8 points per game ... she has 5.7 rebounds per game as well ... junior guard Jennifer Bushby has 11.4 points and 4.7 rebounds per contest ... she leads the entire MAC in assists (5.4 apg) and also paces the Bobcats in steals (1.9 spg) ... junior guard Jenny Poff has 11.2 ppg and 3.7 apg ... Poff has made 66 three-point field goals, while Bushby has made 47 ... sophomore forward Kamille Buckner has 8.8 points and a team-leading 6.1 rebounds per game, and leads the MAC in field-goal percentage (62.9%) ... Buckner also paces the entire league in blocks per game, with 2.0 ... Buckner has started all 28 games this year to date, while Bushby, Hmiel and Poff have made 27 starts apiece ... freshman guard Da'Keisha Mann (3.9 ppg) joins those four players in the probable starting lineup for head coach Semeka Randall ... Randall, in her first season as a collegiate head coach, inherited 10 letterwinners, including three starters, from last year's team ... the 2007-08 Bobcats went 20-13 overall and 10-6 in MAC regular-season play ... the school's athletics web site is www.ohiobobcats.com.
THE SERIES
The Falcons lead Ohio, 44-20, in the all-time series between the teams, and BG won the most recent meeting ... the Brown and Orange picked up a 62-52 win in Athens nearly two months ago (Jan. 10, 2009) ... last year, BGSU took each of last year's regular-season games by 15 points, including a 60-45 win at Anderson Arena (Jan. 12, 2008), but the 'Cats topped the Falcons, 68-66, in double overtime in the semifinal round of the MAC Tournament (March 14, 2008) ... BG has a record of 25-6 in home games vs. the Bobcats, but the teams have split the last two meetings, as Ohio ended BGSU's MAC-record streak of 39-straight wins over conference foes two years ago, with a 70-67 win over the Falcons (Feb. 24, 2007) ... Curt Miller has a record of 10-4 vs. the Bobcats during his head-coaching tenure.
THE FALCONS VS. THE MAC
The Falcons have a proud history in the MAC ... BG enters Saturday's game vs. Ohio with an overall league record of 320-140 (69.6%), the best of all conference institutions ... additionally, BGSU leads the all-time series with all 11 MAC opponents ... BG, obviously, is the only team in the league with a winning series mark against every other school.
MILLER MOVING UP
Last Saturday's (Feb. 28) win over Kent State enabled Falcon head coach Curt Miller to move up on several lists ... the victory was the 93rd conference win since Miller came to BG, breaking the school record and moving him into sole possession of eighth in MAC history ... Miller moved past Jaci Clark to the top of the BGSU list.
MILLER MOVING UP II
The win over KSU also enabled Falcon head coach Curt Miller to move up on the MAC list for overall wins ... Miller now has a total of 175 wins since coming to BGSU ... after Miami's win over the Falcons on Wednesday, he is tied for fourth with current MU head coach Maria Fantanarosa ... Kent State's Bob Lindsay tops both conference lists, with 371 overall wins and 231 MAC victories, while Mark Ehlen ranks second and Fran Voll third.
PASSING THEIR BOARDS
The Falcons held a 36-34 rebounding advantage over Kent State in last Saturday's (Feb. 28) win ... then, BG pulled down a season-high 51 boards at Miami, with a +7 margin in that category ... after the loss to MU, BGSU is now 9-1 this season when outrebounding the opponent ... the Falcons are an impressive 100-9 in such games in the Curt Miller Era.
THE FALCONS ARE ...
• 175-71 since Curt Miller took the BGSU helm in May of 2001;
• 93-34 in MAC games in that time:
• 166-52 in the six-plus years since Miller's assistant coaches have all been in place (associate head coach Jennifer Roos and assistant coach Brandi Poole have been on Miller's staff since his first year; assistant Kevin Eckert joined the staff one year later);
• 154-36 over the last five-plus years, with 2008-09 marking BG's sixth-straight season of at least 20 wins;
• a staggering 133-26 in the past four-plus years, with no fewer than 23 wins in each year (including this year) and a MAC regular-season title in every season;
• an eye-popping 110-18 overall and 58-5 in the MAC regular season in the last three-plus years, since senior Lindsey Goldsberry ventured to Northwest Ohio;
• 82-15 in the last two-plus years, including a 42-5 conference ledger, since juniors Tara Breske, Laura Bugher and Sarah Clapper joined the program;
• 51-11 overall, and 27-4 in MAC regular-season games, since sophomores Chelsea Albert, Tracy Pontius, Lauren Prochaska, Jen Uhl and Kelly Zuercher began their respective playing careers at BGSU;
• 71-6 in the last 77 games vs. MAC opponents (including regular-season and tourney games);
• 35-4 in MAC home games in the last four-plus seasons;
• 30-2 in MAC road games over the last three-plus years (with the lone losses during that time coming last season at Ball State and Wednesday at Miami);
• 10-1 in the MAC Tournament over the last four years, with three titles (2005, '06 and '07) and a trip to the semifinals in 2008;
• 22-2 in non-conference home games since the start of the 2003-04 season;
• 18-1 against non-league foes at Anderson Arena since November of 2004;
• 3-2 in games played on March 7 in program history (with four of those games coming in the MAC Tournament);
• 1-0 in March 7 games that were not MAC Tournament contests (with that lone game being a 95-83 road win over Ohio in 1992); and
• 0-0 on March 7 in the Curt Miller Era, as BG has not played on that date since 1995.
MAC TITLE IS BG'S FIFTH IN A ROW
On Feb. 15, the Falcons clinched the MAC's East Division title ... BGSU's 94-79 win over Central Michigan that afternoon, combined with losses by Kent State and Miami that weekend, put the Brown and Orange six games ahead of both the Golden Flashes and RedHawks, with five games remaining ... as mentioned earlier, BG needs a win over Ohio, or a Ball State loss, to clinch the overall title outright ... regardless, BG already has earned the program's fifth consecutive regular-season conference crown, setting a school record and tying the league mark ... KSU won five-straight titles from 1997-98 through 2001-02.
UHL BE SWELL, UHL BE GREAT...
Sophomore Jen Uhl made the first start of her collegiate career in the Falcons' win at Western Michigan on Feb. 7, and has been in the lineup for each of the last seven games ... Uhl certainly has made the most of the opportunity ... the Wadsworth, Ohio, native averaged 4.0 points and 3.2 rebounds per game over the first 21 games, going 4-of-29 from three-point land duirng that time ... since moving into the starting lineup, Uhl has averaged 7.9 points and 7.1 boards per game, and has gone 6-of-17 (35.3%) from long distance ... she had a career-high 14 rebounds at Miami Wednesday night (March 4).
IN THOSE SEVEN GAMES ...
In the seven games since soph Jen Uhl moved into the starting five, the Falcons have outrebounded the opponents by an average of 37.0 to 35.9 per game ... Uhl, as mentioned, has averaged 7.1 boards per game during that time ... junior Tara Breske, who averaged 6.7 points and 5.7 rebounds over the first 21 games, has had 9.4 ppg and a team-leading 7.7 rpg in the last seven ... and, sophomore Lauren Prochaska has 22.6 points and 6.3 boards per outing over that time.
ON THE HORIZON
Following the Ohio game, the Falcons head to downtown Cleveland for the Kraft MAC Tournament ... BG has earned a first-round bye, and the team's first game will be in the quarterfinals, scheduled for March 13 at 11:00 a.m. ... unlike MAC men's basketball, where teams are seeded from #1 through #12, the women's basketball format seeds teams by division (#1 East, #2 East, etc.).
