Another Milestone for Miller as Falcons Dispatch Jacksonville, 83-53

Sunday, December 11

Bowling Green, Ohio

2:00 PM

Bowling Green State University

Jacksonville

Jackie Motycka Mossing & Greg Christopher - Dec 11 2011

Jackie Motycka Mossing was recognized at halftime of Sunday's game (Brandon Heiss photo)

Another Milestone for Miller as Falcons Dispatch Jacksonville, 83-53

December 11, 2011 | Women's Basketball

BGSU head coach now ranks second on MAC wins list

By: BOWLING GREEN, Ohio (BGSU Athletic Communications)

Curt Miller achieved yet another milestone as his Bowling Green State University women's basketball team led from start to finish in an 83-53 win over Jacksonville University Sunday afternoon (Dec. 11). The non-conference game was held at the Stroh Center.

FINAL STATS: HTML | PDF
PHOTO GALLERY - Brandon Heiss, BGSU Marketing & Communications
POSTGAME AUDIO: Danielle Havel | Curt Miller
Scroll to the bottom of the page for video of the postgame interviews

With the win, the Falcons improve to 7-2 on the season. BGSU has won seven-straight games after an 0-2 start to the year. The Dolphins drop to 0-8.

The win also was the 241st of Miller's head-coaching career, moving him into sole possession of second place on the Mid-American Conference list for overall victories. Miller, who moved past former Toledo coach Mark Ehlen, now trails only Kent State's Bob Lindsay (413 career wins).

The Falcons led from wire to wire, opening up a 38-21 lead at the half and continuing to pull away in the early moments of the second. BGSU shot 57.7 percent from the field after halftime en route to a 52.7% field-goal rate for the game. At the other end of the court, the Falcons held JU to just a 21-for-72 (29.2%) performance from the field.

Redshirt junior Danielle Havel led a balanced scoring attack, scoring a career-high 13 points on her birthday. A total of four Falcons scored in double figures, with eight BGSU players scoring at least six points on the afternoon.

Senior Jessica Slagle scored 12 points vs. the Dolphins, while sophomores Jillian Halfhill and Noelle Yoder had 10 apiece.

All 13 players on the active roster saw action in the game, with 11 posting double-digit minutes-played totals and a 12th, freshman Shanique Ogle, playing eight minutes. Ogle shattered her career best with seven points.

Juniors Allison Papenfuss and Chrissy Steffen and sophomore Jill Stein had six points apiece, with Stein adding seven rebounds and a game- and career-high three blocked shots.

Redshirt sophomore Alexis Rogers led the team with nine rebounds, as BGSU held a 43-40 advantage on the boards. After being outrebounded in each of the first five games of the season, BG has outboarded the opponent in each of the last four contests.

Tracie Sneed led the visitors, with game-high totals of 15 points and 14 boards. Crystal Bell added 10 points off the bench for the Dolphins.

Slowly but surely, the Falcons scored the game's first seven points. Halfhill opened the scoring, taking a pass from Rogers and hitting a three-point field goal from the right corner with just under a minute gone. Then, Steffen scored back-to-back layups, stealing the ball from Sneed and streaking in for an uncontested shot, then grabbing her own miss and laying the ball back up and in.

The Dolphins got on the board with Jade Cargill's jumper at the 16:12 mark, but Slagle hit a pair of layups to begin a 6-0 run for the Falcons. Both of Slagle's shots came in transition, as she got out ahead of the pack to take long passes from Havel and Halfhill, respectively. When Rogers took a pass from Halfhill and scored with 14:42 left, the Falcons had a 13-2 lead and the Dolphins took their second timeout of the afternoon.

Bell scored for the visitors, but Havel got to the line and hit a pair of free throws, and the Falcons' lead never dropped below double digits again.

Papenfuss fed Havel for a layup at the 11:19 mark, before Havel returned the favor just 38 seconds left. When the birthday girl tossed the ball to Papenfuss for a nifty bank shot over two defenders, BGSU's lead was 23-8 as the first period neared the halfway point.

The Falcons' three true sophomores teamed up for a hoop with eight minutes left in the half. Stein blocked a JU shot and grabbed the rebound. Then, Halfhill's entry pass found Stein, who quickly kicked the ball out to Yoder for a three-pointer from the right side. When that shot found nothing but net, BG's lead was 29-10.

Stein split a pair of free throws with just under 15 minutes gone in the game, becoming the 10th different Falcon to score a point in the first half. After a shot by Bell, Slagle sandwiched baskets around a Havel layup, and the Falcons' lead was 20 points, at 36-16. The Dolphins scored five of the final seven points of the period, cutting BG's advantage to 17 points at the break.

BG got off to a quick start in the second half, scoring the first eight points to take a 25-point lead. Slagle scored four of those eight points, and the run was capped by Havel's layup with just over 18 minutes left. BG led by 25 points, at 46-21.

Several minutes later, Havel scored five-straight points, getting herself to the free-throw line for a pair of successful tries, then taking a pass from Slagle and hitting a trailing three-pointer to give the Falcons a 54-26 lead with 15:45 left. The Falcons, after shooting 48.3% in the first half, made 6-of-9 shots to begin the second half, removing any remaining doubt about the game's outcome.

The lead reached 30 points for the first time on a Papenfuss layup with 14:10 left. Later in the half, a 9-0 BG run increased the Falcons' advantage to 35 points. That run saw sophomores (Yoder 4, Stein 1) and freshmen (Ogle and Jasmine Matthews 2 apiece) combine for all nine points.

Out of the final media timeout, freshman Deborah Hoekstra took an inbounds pass from classmate Logan Pastor and drained a three-point shot that barely moved the net. Then, Ogle grabbed her own miss and laid the ball back up and through the hoop, and BG's lead was a game-high 36 points, 80-44. The Dolphins ended the game on a 9-3 run to cut the deficit to 30 points at the final horn.

Slagle was 5-of-7 from the field for the game, while Halfhill and Havel each made 4-of-6 shots from the floor. Halfhill hit a pair of three-pointers in four attempts, and also had a team-high four assists, as the Falcons had 17 helpers in the game. Pastor added three assists without a turnover, while three teammates had two apiece.

Ogle went 3-of-4 from the floor, while Stein was 2-for-3 on the afternoon.

The Falcons now take a break for fall semester exams. BGSU's next game will be next Sunday, Dec. 18, when the Brown and Orange heads to Omaha, Neb., to face Creighton University. Tipoff is scheduled for 1:05 p.m. local time (2:05 p.m. ET).

FALCON NOTES
* Falcon women's basketball legend Jackie (Motycka) Mossing was recognized at halftime of Sunday's game ... Mossing, one of 13 inaugural members into BGSU's Cast of Honor, already has her #43 hanging at the west end of the Stroh Center. the jerseys of each of the members of the Cast of Honor, which was announced in September, are hung in the athletics venue in which their sport competes ... Mossing is the lone women's basketball standout to be recognized in the Cast of Honor.

* Mossing, who played at BGSU from 1985-89, scored the second-most points in the history of basketball (both men's and women's) at Bowling Green ... with 2,122 career points, she was the most prolific scorer in school history until Lauren Prochaska broke her record on Feb. 5, 2011, which ironically was the day the All-Anderson Team, which included Mossing, was announced ... Mossing still sits in sixth place on the Mid-American Conference scoring list.