Eagles Outlast Falcons, 81-74 in Overtime

Wednesday, January 25

Ypsilanti, MI

7:00 PM

Bowling Green State University

5-15 (1-7MAC)

Eastern Michigan

6-14 (1-7MAC)

OT 1

Bowling Green

Eastern Michigan

Carly Santoro - Jan 25 2017 at EMU - Larry Clapper photo

Carly Santoro led BG with 18 points & 13 rebounds at EMU (photo by Larry Clapper)

Photo by: Larry Clapper

January 25, 2017 | Women's Basketball

Box Score

EMU hits 14 free throws in the extra session; Santoro, Tunstall post double-doubles

By: by Mike Cihon, Assistant Director for Athletic Communications

Some late-game heroics by sophomore Carly Santoro and the Bowling Green State University women's basketball team forced overtime, but host Eastern Michigan University hit 14 free throws in the extra session en route to an 81-74 win over the Falcons. Wednesday night's (Jan. 25) Mid-American Conference game was held at the Convocation Center.

Santoro had 18 points to pace four double-digit scorers for the Falcons. Freshman Caterrion Thompson came off the bench to score a career-high 16 points, while seniors Ashley Tunstall and Abby Siefker had 15 and 11 points, respectively.

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FINAL STATISTICS: HTML | PDF
POSTGAME AUDIO: Santoro | Coach Roos
PHOTO GALLERY: Photos courtesy Larry Clapper

Santoro and Tunstall each had a double-double in Wednesday's contest. Santoro pulled down a game-high 13 rebounds, while Tunstall added 11. The two combined for 13 of BG's 18 offensive boards.

Phillis Webb had 27 points to lead the Eagles, and also had a double-double with 11 rebounds. Nailah Mitchell scored 15 points, Sheyna Deans 14 and Micah Robinson 12 for the hosts.

Mitchell made a key play as the third quarter came to an end. After BG got a defensive stop in the final seconds of the period, Mitchell stole the Falcons' outlet pass near midcourt and threw a shot toward the net. The ball caromed off of the backboard and dropped through the hoop, giving the Eagles a 48-47 lead heading into the fourth quarter.

Eastern led by as many as seven points in the fourth period, but the Falcons came all the way back, tying the contest at 59-all on a putback by Siefker with 3:25 to go. Webb hit a total of three free throws on the Eagles' next two possessions, and a Deans jumper gave the home team a 64-60 lead with exactly a minute remaining.

But, Thompson hit a layup, and after a Tunstall steal, Santoro split a pair of shots at the stripe with 29.3 seconds left. The Falcons committed several fouls to get to five for the quarter, and Robinson went to the line. She missed her first free-throw try, but made the second to give EMU a 65-63 lead with 24.4 seconds remaining.

The next possession saw BGSU turn the ball over, as Robinson disrupted the passing lane and got a deflection. Santoro nearly saved the ball with a headlong diving effort in front of the scorer's table, but it went out of bounds with 10.1 seconds to go.

The Eagles inbounded the ball to Deans under her own basket, and Santoro picked her pocket. The BG sophomore poked the ball away, and was fouled by Deans in the scramble for the ball. Santoro went to the line with 6.6 seconds on the clock, and calmly hit both of her shots to tie the score. EMU had one final chance in regulation, but a turnaround shot by Robinson bounced off of the front of the rim as the horn sounded.

But, BG never led in the OT period. After the teams traded free throws, the Eagles got back-to-back trips to the line and went 4-for-4 to take a 70-66 lead with 2:45 left in the period. Santoro answered with a pair of charity tosses, but the Falcons could draw no closer as EMU got to the line on the next two trips down the floor, making 3-of-4 shots during that sequence.

Santoro grabbed an offensive rebound and scored with 90 seconds to go, but the Eagles continued to get to the line, and converted enough shots to maintain the lead.

"You can go from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows in a hurry," said BGSU head coach Jennifer Roos. "We had our chances throughout the second half, and didn't have a lot of luck finishing shots from the outside. We were getting the ball inside with Abby Siefker. She was doing a great job of scoring or getting to the foul line early for us. Her getting in foul trouble, I think, took the wind out of our sails, because we had the height advantage inside.

"But, any time you go 3-of-26 from the arc, it's gonna hurt. I thought a lot of those were good looks that didn't fall in the first half, and then you have a chance to go to into halftime with a double-digit lead instead of a seven-point lead. We made a great effort to come back and force the overtime, and I thought momentum was on our side. But they were able to get to the foul line, get us in more foul trouble and keep us playing from behind during the entire overtime period."

The first quarter saw the Falcons get out to a 6-0 lead, as Siefker hit an up-and-under shot, Santoro knocked down a long two-pointer and Tunstall drained a pull-up jumper. The Eagles got on the board just over three minutes in, but Santoro's layup gave the Brown and Orange an 8-2 lead and prompted an EMU timeout.

Eastern scored the next four points, and after Siefker's nifty pass found freshman Andrea Cecil for a layup, Mitchell's three-pointer got the hosts within a single point. Thompson hit a wide-open layup after rebounding a teammate's missed shot, and after Webb scored for the hosts, Cecil pulled down an offensive board and put an acrobatic shot off glass and through the hoop while being fouled with 31.5 seconds left in the period. Her free-throw completed the three-point play and gave BG a 15-11 lead after 10 minutes.

The Falcons were 0-of-10 from three-point range in the opening period, while EMU went 0-for-5 from the free-throw line. After that period, though, the Eagles were 22-for-30 from the stripe over the remainder of the game.

The second quarter began well for the Falcons, as Siefker blocked a Tori Easley layup try, then grabbed the rebound. On BG's first offensive possession of the quarter, Santoro hit a long two-point try for a 17-11 lead.

Siefker scored on an easy layup after receiving a Santoro pass with no defender near her, but the BG senior then was whistled for her third foul of the night on Easley's layup. The three-point play cut BG's lead to three points, and after Cecil answered with a short jumper, Eastern scored the next five points, with Webb's back-door layup beginning a three-point play that tied the game at 21-21.

Tunstall kicked the ball out to Thompson, however, for a straightaway trey that restored the BG lead. Sophomore Sydney Lambert hit two free throws out of the second-quarter media timeout, and Thompson drilled a corner three at the 3:57 mark. When junior Rachel Myers, who had fed Thompson for that triple, scored an and-one layup on a baseline drive and swished the ensuing free throw, the Falcons had a 32-25 lead. Tunstall's layup then gave BG a nine-point lead, the largest of the game for either team.

Webb responded with a pair of buckets, but junior Haley Puk lobbed the ball inside to Tunstall, and the senior's layup in the final minute of the half gave the Falcons a 36-29 lead at the intermission.

Tunstall's steal just 10 seconds into the second half led to a Santoro free throw, and Tunstall took a Santoro pass and banked home a three-point try to give BG a 40-31 lead early in the third quarter. Back came the Eagles, as a Mitchell layup began a 6-0 run. A dubious foul call went against Siefker -- her fourth foul of the game -- during that stretch, and Webb's layup cut the BG lead to just three points.

Santoro came right back with a driving layup, and after Deans scored inside, Cecil converted a driving layup of her own. But, the hosts went on another 6-0 run, capped by a pair of Robinson charity tosses that gave the Eagles a 45-44 lead with 3:14 left in the period. Tunstall grabbed an offensive board in traffic and put the ball back up and in, and Santoro stole the ball, went coast to coast and was fouled on a layup try with 45.8 seconds left in the period. She split her two shots for a 47-45 lead.

Each team would turn the ball over twice in the final 45 seconds of the period. After EMU's second turnover in that period, Mitchell stole the ball right back and saw her three-point prayer answered as the horn sounded.

The miracle shot seemed to energize the Eagles, who scored the first six points of the fourth quarter. Siefker snapped an overall 9-0 run with two free throws, and after the Falcons forced a shot-clock violation, Thompson drove the paint and banked a shot home. Lambert's steal led to a transition jumper by Thompson, and BG trailed by a single point, 54-53, with six minutes to go.

But, Webb hit a corner three, and Deans made a quick layup after a BG turnover. Suddenly, the EMU lead was back to six points.

Just that quickly, however, the Falcons tied the game with a 6-0 run. Tunstall put back a teammate's miss, Siefker banked a shot off glass and in, and Siefker then pulled down an offensive board and tied the game with a layup with 3:25 to go.

On the next possession, however, Siefker was whistled for her fifth foul, and Webb hit a pair of free throws to give EMU the lead. Another Web free throw, with 2:29 left, made it a 62-59 game, but Tunstall split a pair of shots from the stripe. BG got a defensive stop, but could not capitalize at the other end, and Deans' jumper made it a 64-60 EMU lead and set the stage for the final sixty crazy seconds of regulation.

Webb and Deans each fouled out during that final minute of the fourth quarter. But, Robinson scored seven points and Mitchell five in overtime to lift the hosts to the victory. Mitchell made EMU's only field goal in the OT period, while Robinson was 7-of-10 from the line in the final five minutes.

Cecil had nine points and eight rebounds off the bench for the Falcons, while Tunstall had a game-high four steals in addition to her double-double. Siefker, who was limited to just 21 minutes of playing time due to foul trouble, blocked a pair of shots, and Santoro had two assists and three steals to go along with her team-high point and rebound totals.

BG forced EMU into 23 turnovers on the night, and the Falcons had a 21-5 advantage in second-chance points and a 28-17 margin in bench scoring.

The Eagles went 22-of-35 (62.9%) from the free-throw line in the match, while BG was 17-of-26 (65.4%) from the stripe. Each team made three three-pointers, but EMU attempted only eight while BGSU fired 26 long-distance attempts.

BGSU returns to the road this weekend, facing Kent State University on Saturday (Jan. 28). Tipoff time is 3:00 p.m. at KSU's M.A.C. Center.