Falcons Win Seattle Tournament with 71-51 Victory over Redhawks

Saturday, November 27

Seattle, Wash.

8:00 PM PT

Bowling Green State University

Seattle

Senior Jen Uhl had a double-double in the Falcons' win over Seattle University

November 28, 2010 | Women's Basketball

Prochaska named MVP; Pontius, Steffen join her on all-tourney team

By: SEATTLE, Wash. (BGSU Athletic Communications)

Senior Jen Uhl had a double-double and the Bowling Green State University women's basketball team forced host Seattle University into 22 turnovers in a 71-51 win over the Redhawks Saturday night (Nov. 27). The game, the championship contest of the Seattle Univ. Thanksgiving Tournament, was held at the Connolly Center.

FINAL STATS - HTML | BOXSCORE - PDF
POSTGAME AUDIO: Curt Miller & Lauren Prochaska
Scroll to the bottom of the page for postgame video of Miller & Prochaska

With the victory, the Falcons improve to 6-1 this year, and BGSU has won six consecutive games. The Redhawks drop to 1-5 on the season.

Senior Lauren Prochaska was named the tournament's MVP, while classmate Tracy Pontius and sophomore Chrissy Steffen joined her on the all-tournament team.

Uhl had game-high totals of 17 points and 10 rebounds in Saturday's win, while Steffen's career-high total of 15 points included three three-point field goals.

Prochaska had nine points for the Brown and Orange, while sophomore Allison Papenfuss added eight points off the bench.

Elle Kerfoot led Seattle with 14 points, while Salena Dickerson scored 11. The Redhawks held a 40-37 rebounding advantage, becoming the first team to outrebound the Falcons in seven games this season.

The Falcons spotted the hosts a three-point lead to start the game, then went on a 7-0 run. Steffen began that run with a three-pointer, and Prochaska then stole the ball from Daidra Brown and scored on an uncontested layup. Then, Steffen's nifty baseline drive and dish freed Uhl for an easy layup.

But, back came the hosts, as Brown made a pair of free throws, and Dickerson hit a triple to give Seattle an 8-7 advantage with five minutes gone.

Junior Jessica Slagle hit a long straightaway two-pointer to give the Brown and Orange a 9-8 lead. Slagle's hoop was the only scoring by either team in a three-and-a-half-minute span.

Pontius broke that drought by splitting a pair of free throws, and Papenfuss grabbed an offensive board and laid the ball back up and in. BGSU's lead was 12-8 and SU took a timeout.

The BG run continued, however, as Prochaska hit a fast-break three-pointer off of a pass from Pontius. Then, senior Maggie Hennegan kicked the ball out to Papenfuss, who drained her first career three-point field goal. That shot capped an 11-0 run and gave the Falcons an 18-8 lead.

The Redhawks hung around, making their living from three-point land over the next few minutes. Meanwhile, at the other end of the floor, the Falcons were getting to the foul line relatively often, and were making some of those free-throw tries.

SU cut BG's lead to 21-14 on a Dickerson triple, but Prochaska sank a pair of tosses several minutes later, putting the Falcons head by eight points. Then, after a Redhawk miss, the Falcons were off and running, as Pontius fired a pass to a wide-open Uhl, who filled the lane for a layup and a 26-16 lead.

Tatiana Heck put back her own miss with 3:35 left in the half, but Steffen proceeded to score eight points over the remainder of the period. First, she drilled a long two-pointer, giving the Falcons a 10-point lead. Then, after Brown made two free throws at the other end, Steffen hit a rainmaking triple after taking a pass from Pontius, and BG's lead was 31-20.

Steffen came up with a steal on the ensuing possession, firing a long pass ahead to Prochaska. The Falcon senior was fouled in the act of shooting a layup, and made both tosses for a 33-20 lead.

The second free throw increased Prochaska's streak of consecutive FTs made to 43, just two shy of her own school record.

The hosts answered with a layup, but Steffen stopped out behind the arc once again, hitting a long-distance shot with 36 seconds left. That shot gave the Falcons a 36-22 lead at the intermission.

The second half saw Hennegan work inside to score on BGSU's first possession, just 13 seconds in. Then, however, both teams went cold, as neither the Falcons or the Redhawks would score for nearly three minutes.

Finally, senior Kelly Zuercher lobbed a pass inside to Papenfuss for an easy layup. With exactly 17 minutes left, the Falcons led by a 40-22 count.

Kerfoot scored back-to-back layups, but Zuercher then hit a three-pointer for a 15-point BG advantage. After SU's Kacie Sowell scored in the paint several minutes later, junior Jessica Slagle came right back with a three-pointer in transition. Then, Slagle found Uhl for a three-pointer and a 50-30 lead.

The hosts' Ashley Ward converted a conventional three-point play, but Zuercher hit Uhl for a layup and a 19-point lead. Ward countered with a three-pointer, but redshirt sophomore Danielle Havel made back-to-back hoops, including a sweet baseline drive and a left-corner shot with one toe on the three-point line, to restore the 20-point margin with eight minutes left.

The Redhawks, however, got an 'and-one' layup from Heck and a three-point basket from Julee Christianson, cutting BG's lead to 56-42 and prompting Falcon coach Curt Miller to call timeout with six and a half minutes remaining.

Hennegen's one-handed turnaround shot stopped the Redhawks' mini-run, and -- after Kerfoot's layup, Uhl hit another three-pointer to begin a game-clinching 11-0 run. Uhl and Steffen scored all 11 points in that span.

Steffen knocked down a pair of free throws with 4:40 left, and Uhl missed a three-pointer, but sliced through traffic to snare the rebound and lay the ball up and in. After two more Steffen free throws, Uhl made another layup, with freshman Jill Stein assisting, and BG's lead was a game-high 25 points, 69-44, with three minutes left.

Freshman Noelle Yoder scored BG's final points on a pair of free throws in the final minute.

The Falcons held a 25-10 advantage in points off turnovers, including a 14-0 margin in that category in the first half. BG had 11 steals, with Steffen leading all players with four. The sophomore had nine total steals in the two games in Seattle.

BGSU shot 41.1 percent from the field on Saturday, but held the Redhawks to just a 32.7% conversion rate, including a 7-for-24 effort (29.2%) in the first half.

The Falcons' nine three-pointers came from six different players. Steffen, as mentioned, had three, while Uhl was 2-of-3 from long range.

In the game, Prochaska moved past Ali Mann (2003-07) into second place on the BGSU career scoring list. With 1,830 career points, the BG senior is now five points clear of Mann's impressive career total. Only the legendary Jackie Motycka (2,122 career points) is ahead of Prochaska on the Falcon career scoring chart.

UALR's Asriel Rolfe and Seattle's Kerfoot joined Prochaska, Pontius and Steffen on the all-tournament team. UALR defeated Montana State, 51-48, in Saturday's consolation game.

The Falcons now return to Northwest Ohio to prepare for a Wednesday (Dec. 1) game vs. nationally-ranked Vanderbilt University. Tipoff is 7:00 p.m. at Anderson Arena.