Broncos Advance to Cleveland with 85-71 Win over Falcons

Monday, March 5

Kalamazoo, MI

5:30 PM ET

Bowling Green State University

11-19, 3-15MAC

Western Michigan (First Round)

17-14, 9-9MAC

Bowling Green

Western Michigan

March 05, 2018 | Women's Basketball

Box Score

Santoro paces three double-figure scorers with 22

By: KALAMAZOO, Mich. (BGSU Athletic Communications)

Junior Carly Santoro scored 22 points to pace three players in double figures, but the Bowling Green State University women's basketball team fell, 85-71, to Western Michigan University Monday night (March 5). The game, a first-round contest in the Mid-American Conference Tournament, was held at University Arena.

LINKS
BGSU-WMU STATISTICS: PDF
POSTGAME AUDIO: Coach Roos

Sophomore Andrea Cecil scored 16 points and junior Sydney Lambert added 10 for the Falcons (11-19), who see the 2017-18 season come to an end.

Three players combined for 75 of Western Michigan's (17-14) 85 points. Jordan Walker scored 32 points, while Breanna Mobley had 22 along with 10 rebounds. Deja Wimby scored 21 points and had 12 assists.

After a wildly entertaining first half in which each team shot better than 50 percent from the field, the Falcons and Broncos were tied, 40-40. Early in the third quarter, however, the Broncos erased a three-point deficit with a 7-0 run to take the lead for good.

Moments later, a six-point run by the home team made it a nine-point game, and the lead reached double digits by the end of the quarter. The Broncos shot 67% from the floor in the fourth quarter to keep the Falcons at bay.

QUOTING COACH ROOS
"It was a fun game; we shot a great percentage, they shot a great percentage. It was very back-and-forth, there was good execution by both teams and low turnover totals by both teams in that first half."

"But then, Jordan Walker stepped up for them. We knew we had to try and contain (Deja) Wimby and (Breanna) Mobley, because those two kids can really score. But, the X-factor wound up being Walker. She got loose and hit some deep 3's. She was a difference-maker for them."

"Haley Puk and Rachel Myers are fantastic kids, and their teammates wanted to win so badly tonight to send them to Cleveland. They have been tremendous leaders for our program throughout their career. When you have so many underclassmen say so many good things about them, it speaks volumes about how special they are to this program."

FIRST-QUARTER HIGHLIGHTS

Sophomore Andrea Cecil and WMU's Deja Wimby each scored 11 points in the game's first 10 minutes. Cecil went 3-for-4 from the arc in the first period, while Wimby was 5-of-6 from inside the three-point line.
Breanna Mobley scored on the game's first possession, and a Wimby layup gave the Broncos a 4-0 lead with two minutes gone. Santoro got the Falcons on the board with a jumper, and moments later, Cecil knocked down back-to-back three-point tries to give the Brown and Orange an 8-6 lead.
Santoro hit a foul-line jumper, and sophomore Caterrion Thompson drained a pull-up J for a 12-10 BG lead six minutes into the game. But, Wimby's layup was followed by a Walker triple.
Cecil, however, threw in a tough shot, and she then took a pass from senior Haley Puk and drilled her third three-pointer of the night for a 17-16 lead.
Thompson hit a layup with 19.8 seconds to go, capping a 7-0 BG run, before Wimby's putback at the buzzer cut BG's lead to 19-18.
The Falcons hit three three-pointers as a team in Saturday's regular-season finale at Buffalo, and no BG player scored more than eight points. But, on Monday night, Cecil hit three three-pointers and reached double digits in the scoring column in the first quarter alone.

SECOND-QUARTER HIGHLIGHTS

Puk hit a pull-up jumper over a taller defender on BG's first possession, and Cecil got a tough right-side banker to go, giving the Falcons a 23-20 lead. But, a quick 5-0 run gave the hosts a two-point lead, prompting a BG timeout.
Santoro took a pass from Cecil and knocked down a rainbow three from the left wing, but Mobley scored inside. But, moments later, Santoro threw in an and-one runner, and her free throw gave BG a 29-27 lead with 4:12 on the clock.
Mobley and Walker scored for the hosts, but junior Sydney Lambert hit a layup, and Caterrion Thompson immediately stole Wimby's inbounds pass and hit a jumper for a 33-31 BG lead. After a pair of Mobley free throws tied the score, Santoro got a runner to go as part of her second three-point play in a two-minute span.
Walker's three-ball tied the score, but Caterrion Thompson hit a foul-line jumper. Marley Hill answered with a layup, and Walker's jumper in the final minute gave WMU the lead, but Santoro responded with a jumper that tied the score with five seconds to go.
Santoro scored 11 of BG's 21 points in the quarter, going 4-of-5 from the field, while Walker was a perfect 4-for-4 en route to 10 second-quarter points for the Broncos.

THIRD-QUARTER HIGHLIGHTS

The game was tied nine times during the first half, and it was tied two more times in the first two minutes of the third quarter. Puk threw a pass inside to freshman Angela Perry for a banker, and after a nifty Lambert drive and no-look pass, Cecil made the 'extra pass' to find an open Puk for a left-side triple and a 45-42 lead.
But, Najee Smith's corner three tied the game, and Mobley then hit back-to-back layups. Cecil answered with a nifty driving shot, but the Broncos made three free throws to the Falcons' one over the next few minutes. Finally, after the teams went over four minutes without a field goal, Walker's triple gave the hosts a seven-point lead – the largest advantage for either team at that point – with 2:52 left in the quarter.
Walker hit a jumper, and after freshman Kennedy Williams lobbed the ball inside for a Perry layup, a Walker three made it a 60-50 game. Walker, who scored her team's final 10 points of the period, hit a layup in the final seconds.

FOURTH-QUARTER HIGHLIGHTS

Puk made a foul-line jumper on the first possession of the fourth quarter, but Mobley answered with a turnaround shot, and a steal led to a Wimby layup and a 14-point Western lead.
After Perry hit two charity tosses, the Falcons played solid defense for over a minute, but the Broncos kept the ball alive until a player in a white uniform could grab the rebound. The hosts missed three-straight shots, but kept getting the rebound, and finally, Emma VanZanten's jumper gave WMU a 68-54 lead after the Broncos had held the ball for 92 seconds.
Redshirt freshman Clare Glowniak grabbed an offensive board of her own and kicked the ball out to Lambert for a corner three midway through the period, and a Lambert putback made it a 72-59 game. Moments later, Lambert swished another three-point try, cutting the deficit to 11, but after Wimby threw a wild shot off of the backboard, Mobley cleaned up the miss for a 75-62 lead with 3:34 remaining.
The lead reached a game-high 17 points, before Santoro converted yet another three-point play, then made two free throws and a layup with just under two minutes to go. The Broncos continued to answer at the other end, however, and the lead never dropped below 14 points again.
Senior Rachel Myers capped the game's scoring, as she was fouled on a baseline drive with 25.1 seconds left, and knocked down both of the resulting free throws.

BGSU-WMU NOTES & NUMBERS

Sophomore Andrea Cecil and freshman Angela Perry joined senior Haley Puk and juniors Sydney Lambert and Carly Santoro in the Falcons' starting lineup on Monday night. Lambert, Puk and Santoro started all 30 games in 2017=18, while Cecil made 24 starts. Perry started each of the last nine games of the year.
Santoro, as mentioned earlier, led the Falcons with 22 points and seven rebounds on the night. Cecil scored 16 points, while Lambert added 10. Cecil went 3-for-5 from the arc, while Lambert was 2-for-5 from long range.
Caterrion Thompson had eight points, Puk seven and Perry six.
For the Broncos, as mentioned, the trio of Walker, Mobley and Wimby combined for 75 of the team's 85 points.
The Broncos shot 58.2% from the field on the night, hitting at least 50% of their shots in each of the four quarters. Western was 6-for-16 (37.5%) from three-point range and 15-of-22 (68.2%) from the free-throw line.
The Falcons shot 46.6% from the floor, and BG was 7-of-17 (41.2%) from the arc and 10-for-12 (83.3%) from the stripe.

THANKS, SENIORS

Monday's game marked the final career contest for seniors Rachel Myers and Haley Puk.
Myers scored a total of 631 career points in 108 games, an average of 5.8 points per contest. She hit 118 career three-point field goals to rank 15th in BGSU history.
Puk played in 116 games as a Falcon, scoring 689 points (5.9 ppg) and adding 262 rebounds, 129 assists and 90 steals. Puk hit 121 career triples (the 14th-highest total in school history), including a career-high 44 this season.

UP NEXT

The Falcons, the No. 11 seed for the conference tournament, see the season come to an end. A total of 12 of the 14 players on the active roster have at least one year of eligibility remaining. That group combined for 84.6% of the team's scoring and 92.7% of the rebounding.

FOLLOW THE FALCONS

For more information on all things BGSU women's basketball, follow the Falcons on Twitter (@BGAthletics and @BGSUwbb), Instagram (@bgsuwbasketball) and Snapchat (BGSU Falcons) as well as on the web right here at BGSUFalcons.com.