Bowling Green State University Athletics
Bowling Green State University
Michigan
Michigan Roars Back for 5-1 Win over BGSU
September 23, 2009 | Men's Soccer
The host
MICHIGAN 5, BGSU 1 - Final Stats | MICHIGAN 5, BGSU 1 - PDF Boxscore
Running Diary of Wednesday's Match
VIDEO: Max Weston's goal
With the win, the nationally-ranked Wolverines improve to 7-1-0 on the season.
Justin Meram had a hat trick for the Wolverines, who scored late in the first half, then exploded for four goals in a span of just over 12 minutes in the second half.
Redshirt sophomore Max Weston had given the Falcons a 1-0 lead with his first collegiate goal just 9:34 into the contest. Meram, however, knotted the score with 5:30 remaining before halftime, then scored again with 4:11 gone in the second period to give the Wolverines the lead for good.
U-M, ranked as high as 15th in the national polls, outshot the Falcons by a 23-6 margin, including a 16-2 advantage in the second half. Chris Blais made two saves in goal for the hosts, before giving way to Tim Bergsma just over two-thirds of the way through the night. Bergsma was not called upon to make a save.
For the Falcons, redshirt freshman Jeff Smoker played the entire match, making four saves.
The Falcons played without a pair of starters, including the team's leading scorer, Cameron Hepple. The senior had scored five of BGSU's first eight goals on the year prior to Wednesday. Additionally, freshman Chris McLean did not suit up for Wednesday's match.
And, with just over eight minutes gone, Thomas McLean collided with a U-M player and went down with an injury. He missed the remainder of the match.
But, less than two minutes after that stoppage, the Falcons got on the board. Weston, streaking down the right side of the pitch, took a pass from the center of the field and perfectly slotted a low shot. His shot was just out of the reach of a diving Blais, and wound up just inside of the left post. Seniors Jacob Lawrence and Chuko Evwaraye drew assists on Weston's goal.
With approximately 14 minutes left before halftime, senior Gavin Dozier and Evwaraye worked a give-and-go play that resulted in a hard shot by Dozier from about 15 yards out. But, Blais was able to make a nice diving stop in traffic.
Then, with five-and-a-half minutes on the clock, Meram took a long ball from Chase Tennant, made several moves to elude hit defender, and converted to tie the score.
Meram's second goal came on a header off a nifty right-side cross from Brian Klemczak. Then, only 28 seconds later, Hamoody Saad doubled the Wolverines' lead after taking a pass from Daniel Gray and finding the back of the net.
Meram completed his hat trick after a give-and-go with Latif Alashe, and Mauro Fuzetti finished the scoring in the 62nd minute with his seventh goal of the season.
The Falcons return to the road this weekend, beginning the Mid-American Conference schedule with a Saturday (Sept. 26) night game against the top-ranked team in the nation, the
FALCON NOTES
* Redshirt sophomore Max Weston, as mentioned, scored the first goal of his collegiate career ... Weston is in his first season at BGSU after transferring from Indiana University.
* Weston is currently second on the team in scoring with four points ... he has a team-leading two assists in addition to his goal ... senior Cameron Hepple leads the Falcons with 11 points on the year.
* Seniors Chuko Evwaraye and Jacob Lawrence each assisted on Weston's Wednesday goal ... for both players, the assist was the first of the season ... in fact, for Evwaraye, it marked his first career assist.
* Evwaraye now has 19 career points at BGSU ... he has nine goals and the assist ... Hepple (12 goals, nine assists, 33 points) is BG's active career leader in all three scoring categories, and Evwaraye is second among current Falcons in goals and points.
* Evwaraye now has three points this year to date, along with a two-game point streak ... he scored BG's goal in Sunday's IPFW match.
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* BGSU now has scored five first-half goals this year ... last season, the Falcons scored only three first-half goals in 19 matches.
* Weston's goal was BG's earliest in a game in nearly two years ... the Falcons had not scored in the first 10 minutes of a game since Nov. 2, 2007 ... on that date, both Thomas McLean (1:33) and Chuko Evwaraye (5:11) scored in the first five-plus minutes of a 3-1 win over Northern Illinois at BGSU's Cochrane Field.
