Thursday, November 11
DeKalb, IL
7:00 PM
Bowling Green State University
at
#19/20 Northern Illinois (Semifinals)
Photo by: Mallory Hiser, BGSU Athletics
What To Watch For: Falcons Meet #19/20 NIU in MAC Tournament Semifinals
November 09, 2021 | Men's Soccer
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BGSU faces the top-seeded Huskies on Thursday in DeKalb
RV FALCONS at #19/20 NORTHERN ILLINOIS – Thursday, November 11
MAC TOURNAMENT SEMIFINAL
7:00 p.m. | NIU Soccer and Track & Field Complex | DeKalb, Ill.
• Video/Web Stream: NIU All-Access •
• Live Stats: NIUHuskies.com | Twitter: @BGSUmenssoccer •
WHAT TO WATCH FOR...
• The Bowling Green State University men's soccer team heads to DeKalb, Ill., for this week's Mid-American Conference Tournament. Head coach Eric Nichols and the Falcons, the tourney's fourth-seeded team, will face top-seeded Northern Illinois University on Thursday (Nov. 11), with first touch scheduled for 6:00 p.m. locally (7:00 p.m. ET) at the NIU Soccer and Track & Field Complex.
• The BGSU-NIU match will be the second semifinal of the day. Thursday's first match will see number-two seed West Virginia University taking on third-seeded Georgia State University at 3:00 p.m. local time (4:00 p.m. ET).
• The two semifinal-round survivors will meet in Sunday's (Nov. 14) league tourney final, which is set to begin at 12:00 p.m. (1:00 p.m. ET) in DeKalb.
HOW TO FOLLOW THE FALCONS
• All three MAC Tournament matches will be streamed, free of charge, at NIUHuskies.com. Live stats will be available as well, and twitter updates can be found at @BGSUmenssoccer.
• Links to live audio/video/stats for all 2021 matches can be found on the web at BGSUFalcons.com (on the men's soccer schedule page as well as at the top of the main page) on game day.
THE FALCONS AND THE MAC TOURNAMENT
• BGSU enters Thursday's NIU match with an all-time record of 20-18-0 in the MAC Tournament. The Falcons are 7-5-0 in quarterfinal-round matches, 10-6-0 in the semifinal round and 3-7-0 in the championship match through the years.
• The Falcons are 6-3-0 in home matches, 5-6-0 in true road matches and 9-9-0 in neutral-site games. BG has a record of 5-2-0 in overtime contests in the league tournament.
• The MAC did not hold a tournament in the 2020(-21) season, but the Falcons advanced to the final in the 2019 MAC Tournament. BGSU – the fourth seed that year as well – picked up a home win over #5 Northern Illinois and a road victory over #1 Akron, before losing to #6 West Virginia in the championship match.
• That 2019 win at Akron was BGSU's first MAC Tournament road win since 2006.
• BGSU has a record of 6-5-0 all-time when playing a MAC Tournament match as the number-four seed. The Falcons are 4-5-0 in matches against the number-one seed.
• The Falcons won three-straight league tourney titles from 1995-97, part of a run in which the Brown and Orange advanced to the championship match in five consecutive seasons between 1994 and '98. BG got back to the final in 2000, 2002, 2003, 2014 and 2019.
• A complete match-by-match list of BGSU's league tourney results can be found on in the PDF version of these notes.
FALCONS VS. NIU IN THE MAC TOURNAMENT
• BGSU heads into Thursday with a record of 3-3-0 vs. Northern Illinois in the MAC Tournament. All six previous meetings came in the quarterfinal round. BGSU is 2-1-0 vs. the Huskies at home, 0-1-0 on the road and 1-1-0 at neutral sites in league tourney action. Most recently, the teams met in the 2019 quarterfinals, with BGSU picking up a 2-1 overtime win on a frigid evening at Cochrane Stadium.
FALCONS. HUSKIES. TOURNEY TIME.
(BGSU's meetings with NIU in the league tourney)
Year Seeds* Round Site Result
1997 3/6 Quarters N (Oxford, Ohio) W 4-1
1999 3/6 Quarters A L 2-4
2003 4/5 Quarters H W 2-1
2007 4/5 Quarters H L 0-3
2008 7/2 Quarters N (Akron, Ohio) L 0-2
2019 4/5 Quarters H W 2-1 (OT)
2021 4/1 Semis A Thursday
* BG's seed listed first, then NIU's seed
FASCINATING FALCON FACTS
• The Falcons are 10-4-3 on the season, and BGSU went 2-2-2 in MAC play to finish fourth in the seven-team conference. BG ended the regular season with a 2-0 loss at West Virginia on Thursday (Nov. 4).
• BG went 6-2-1 in a month-long stretch from mid-September to mid-October, before suffering a 5-1 loss at Akron on Oct. 22. The Falcons responded with a dominant 3-0 win at Oakland (Oct. 26) before playing Western Michigan to a 1-1 draw (Oct. 30).
• BGSU began the month of October (some call it 'MACtober') with a pair of home wins over the league's two newest members. The Falcons defeated Georgia State (3-2) and Georgia Southern (4-0) at Cochrane Stadium before going on the road and earning a 1-1 draw vs. NIU in a matchup of top-25 teams.
• BGSU began the season with a 3-0-1 mark, picking up road wins over Gonzaga, Cleveland State and Michigan State by an 8-1 aggregate in that time. Marshall got a goal with just 93 seconds left in the second half as the defending national champions downed the Falcons, 1-0, on Sept. 11. But, the Orange and Brown bounced back with four-straight wins, including shutout victories over Wright State, then #13/17 FIU and Detroit Mercy.
•BGSU led by two goals on only one occasion during all of last season, and never had a three-goal lead in the spring. But, the Falcons have led by two or more goals in eight of the last 15 games, winning seven such skirmishes by multiple goals.
• BGSU scored as many as two goals in a match only three times in 13 games in the spring. But, the Falcons have recorded two or more goals 10 times in 17 matches this season to date.
• The Falcons have scored three or more goals six times this year after doing so only once in those 13 spring matches.
• BGSU is now 75-8-6 when scoring two or more goals in a match in the Eric Nichols Era.
• BG is 5-1-2 at home and 5-3-1 on the road, and the Falcons have topped the home, road and overall win totals for all of last season. BGSU has outscored opponents by a 31-16 count this season.
• Alberto Anaya and Jacob Erlandson lead a balanced Falcon scoring attack which features six players with at least 10 points. Anaya and Erlandson each have 14 points on five goals and four assists. Anaya picked up his third game-winning goal of the season in the win at Oakland, while Erlandson has a pair of GWG.
• Roberto Fernandez Garrido has 13 points, including a team-high six goals. He came off the bench to score in the second half vs. WMU. Kyle Cusimano has 12 points on the year, while Sergi Martinez has 11 and Nathan Masters 10.
• Cusimano leads the Falcons with eight assists this fall, while Martinez, who has three goals and five assists on the season, was chosen as the United Soccer Coaches Division I Player of the Week on Sept. 22.
• Masters, who assisted on BG's first goal at Oakland, was taken down in the box to draw the PK that resulted in the Falcons' second goal of the night.
• Logan Kowalczyk played every second between the posts in the season's first 14 matches. He has seven shutouts and a goals-against average of just 0.89. Kowalczyk has kept 12 clean sheets in 26 career starts at BGSU.
• Brendan Graves made his season debut at Oakland, and recorded the first shutout of his BG career. Graves also played vs. WMU and WVU, and now has 13 saves and a GAA of 0.93 in 290 minutes of work this fall.
• Entering the NIU contest, the Falcons have an overall record of 35-18-7 over the last 60 games, dating to late in the 2018 season. Twelve of the 18 setbacks in that time have come by a single goal.
CAPTAINS
• Zach Buescher, Jacob Erlandson and Jensen Lukacsko are the captains of the 2021 Falcons.
THE OPPONENT
• Northern Illinois enters Thursday's match with a 12-2-2 overall record, and the Huskies captured the MAC regular-season title with a 4-0-2 league mark. NIU ended the regular season with a 4-0 loss at Portland on Wednesday (Nov. 3), snapping a 13-match unbeaten streak. Northern's only other loss came at Notre Dame back on Aug. 30. Nick Markanich has team-leading totals of 14 goals and 32 points, and has five game-winning goals on the year. Martin Sanchez has started all 16 contests in goal, and has 35 saves, eight complete-match shutouts and a GAA of just 0.71. NIU is 6-0-1 at home and 6-2-1 on the road this season to date.
THE SERIES
• BGSU and NIU are tied, 17-17-2, in the all-time series, and the Falcons are unbeaten in the last eight matchups. BG won seven-straight contests before the teams battled to a 1-1 draw in this year's regular-season meeting in DeKalb (Oct. 16, 2021). The Falcons picked up a pair of one-goal wins (1-0 on the road, 2-1 in OT at Cochrane) in the spring of 2021. NIU's last victory over the Falcons was a 1-0 OT decision in BG on Oct. 3, 2015. The Falcons are 11-7-0 at home, 5-9-2 on the road and 1-1-0 in neutral-site matches vs. the Huskies over the years.
UP NEXT
• The BGSU-NIU winner advances to Sunday's (Nov. 14) MAC Tournament final, facing either Georgia State or West Virginia. The championship contest begins at 1:00 p.m. ET.
• The winner of Sunday's match will earn the MAC's automatic bid to the NCAA Championships.
MAC TOURNAMENT SEMIFINAL
7:00 p.m. | NIU Soccer and Track & Field Complex | DeKalb, Ill.
• Video/Web Stream: NIU All-Access •
• Live Stats: NIUHuskies.com | Twitter: @BGSUmenssoccer •
WHAT TO WATCH FOR...
• The Bowling Green State University men's soccer team heads to DeKalb, Ill., for this week's Mid-American Conference Tournament. Head coach Eric Nichols and the Falcons, the tourney's fourth-seeded team, will face top-seeded Northern Illinois University on Thursday (Nov. 11), with first touch scheduled for 6:00 p.m. locally (7:00 p.m. ET) at the NIU Soccer and Track & Field Complex.
• The BGSU-NIU match will be the second semifinal of the day. Thursday's first match will see number-two seed West Virginia University taking on third-seeded Georgia State University at 3:00 p.m. local time (4:00 p.m. ET).
• The two semifinal-round survivors will meet in Sunday's (Nov. 14) league tourney final, which is set to begin at 12:00 p.m. (1:00 p.m. ET) in DeKalb.
HOW TO FOLLOW THE FALCONS
• All three MAC Tournament matches will be streamed, free of charge, at NIUHuskies.com. Live stats will be available as well, and twitter updates can be found at @BGSUmenssoccer.
• Links to live audio/video/stats for all 2021 matches can be found on the web at BGSUFalcons.com (on the men's soccer schedule page as well as at the top of the main page) on game day.
THE FALCONS AND THE MAC TOURNAMENT
• BGSU enters Thursday's NIU match with an all-time record of 20-18-0 in the MAC Tournament. The Falcons are 7-5-0 in quarterfinal-round matches, 10-6-0 in the semifinal round and 3-7-0 in the championship match through the years.
• The Falcons are 6-3-0 in home matches, 5-6-0 in true road matches and 9-9-0 in neutral-site games. BG has a record of 5-2-0 in overtime contests in the league tournament.
• The MAC did not hold a tournament in the 2020(-21) season, but the Falcons advanced to the final in the 2019 MAC Tournament. BGSU – the fourth seed that year as well – picked up a home win over #5 Northern Illinois and a road victory over #1 Akron, before losing to #6 West Virginia in the championship match.
• That 2019 win at Akron was BGSU's first MAC Tournament road win since 2006.
• BGSU has a record of 6-5-0 all-time when playing a MAC Tournament match as the number-four seed. The Falcons are 4-5-0 in matches against the number-one seed.
• The Falcons won three-straight league tourney titles from 1995-97, part of a run in which the Brown and Orange advanced to the championship match in five consecutive seasons between 1994 and '98. BG got back to the final in 2000, 2002, 2003, 2014 and 2019.
• A complete match-by-match list of BGSU's league tourney results can be found on in the PDF version of these notes.
FALCONS VS. NIU IN THE MAC TOURNAMENT
• BGSU heads into Thursday with a record of 3-3-0 vs. Northern Illinois in the MAC Tournament. All six previous meetings came in the quarterfinal round. BGSU is 2-1-0 vs. the Huskies at home, 0-1-0 on the road and 1-1-0 at neutral sites in league tourney action. Most recently, the teams met in the 2019 quarterfinals, with BGSU picking up a 2-1 overtime win on a frigid evening at Cochrane Stadium.
FALCONS. HUSKIES. TOURNEY TIME.
(BGSU's meetings with NIU in the league tourney)
Year Seeds* Round Site Result
1997 3/6 Quarters N (Oxford, Ohio) W 4-1
1999 3/6 Quarters A L 2-4
2003 4/5 Quarters H W 2-1
2007 4/5 Quarters H L 0-3
2008 7/2 Quarters N (Akron, Ohio) L 0-2
2019 4/5 Quarters H W 2-1 (OT)
2021 4/1 Semis A Thursday
* BG's seed listed first, then NIU's seed
FASCINATING FALCON FACTS
• The Falcons are 10-4-3 on the season, and BGSU went 2-2-2 in MAC play to finish fourth in the seven-team conference. BG ended the regular season with a 2-0 loss at West Virginia on Thursday (Nov. 4).
• BG went 6-2-1 in a month-long stretch from mid-September to mid-October, before suffering a 5-1 loss at Akron on Oct. 22. The Falcons responded with a dominant 3-0 win at Oakland (Oct. 26) before playing Western Michigan to a 1-1 draw (Oct. 30).
• BGSU began the month of October (some call it 'MACtober') with a pair of home wins over the league's two newest members. The Falcons defeated Georgia State (3-2) and Georgia Southern (4-0) at Cochrane Stadium before going on the road and earning a 1-1 draw vs. NIU in a matchup of top-25 teams.
• BGSU began the season with a 3-0-1 mark, picking up road wins over Gonzaga, Cleveland State and Michigan State by an 8-1 aggregate in that time. Marshall got a goal with just 93 seconds left in the second half as the defending national champions downed the Falcons, 1-0, on Sept. 11. But, the Orange and Brown bounced back with four-straight wins, including shutout victories over Wright State, then #13/17 FIU and Detroit Mercy.
•BGSU led by two goals on only one occasion during all of last season, and never had a three-goal lead in the spring. But, the Falcons have led by two or more goals in eight of the last 15 games, winning seven such skirmishes by multiple goals.
• BGSU scored as many as two goals in a match only three times in 13 games in the spring. But, the Falcons have recorded two or more goals 10 times in 17 matches this season to date.
• The Falcons have scored three or more goals six times this year after doing so only once in those 13 spring matches.
• BGSU is now 75-8-6 when scoring two or more goals in a match in the Eric Nichols Era.
• BG is 5-1-2 at home and 5-3-1 on the road, and the Falcons have topped the home, road and overall win totals for all of last season. BGSU has outscored opponents by a 31-16 count this season.
• Alberto Anaya and Jacob Erlandson lead a balanced Falcon scoring attack which features six players with at least 10 points. Anaya and Erlandson each have 14 points on five goals and four assists. Anaya picked up his third game-winning goal of the season in the win at Oakland, while Erlandson has a pair of GWG.
• Roberto Fernandez Garrido has 13 points, including a team-high six goals. He came off the bench to score in the second half vs. WMU. Kyle Cusimano has 12 points on the year, while Sergi Martinez has 11 and Nathan Masters 10.
• Cusimano leads the Falcons with eight assists this fall, while Martinez, who has three goals and five assists on the season, was chosen as the United Soccer Coaches Division I Player of the Week on Sept. 22.
• Masters, who assisted on BG's first goal at Oakland, was taken down in the box to draw the PK that resulted in the Falcons' second goal of the night.
• Logan Kowalczyk played every second between the posts in the season's first 14 matches. He has seven shutouts and a goals-against average of just 0.89. Kowalczyk has kept 12 clean sheets in 26 career starts at BGSU.
• Brendan Graves made his season debut at Oakland, and recorded the first shutout of his BG career. Graves also played vs. WMU and WVU, and now has 13 saves and a GAA of 0.93 in 290 minutes of work this fall.
• Entering the NIU contest, the Falcons have an overall record of 35-18-7 over the last 60 games, dating to late in the 2018 season. Twelve of the 18 setbacks in that time have come by a single goal.
CAPTAINS
• Zach Buescher, Jacob Erlandson and Jensen Lukacsko are the captains of the 2021 Falcons.
THE OPPONENT
• Northern Illinois enters Thursday's match with a 12-2-2 overall record, and the Huskies captured the MAC regular-season title with a 4-0-2 league mark. NIU ended the regular season with a 4-0 loss at Portland on Wednesday (Nov. 3), snapping a 13-match unbeaten streak. Northern's only other loss came at Notre Dame back on Aug. 30. Nick Markanich has team-leading totals of 14 goals and 32 points, and has five game-winning goals on the year. Martin Sanchez has started all 16 contests in goal, and has 35 saves, eight complete-match shutouts and a GAA of just 0.71. NIU is 6-0-1 at home and 6-2-1 on the road this season to date.
THE SERIES
• BGSU and NIU are tied, 17-17-2, in the all-time series, and the Falcons are unbeaten in the last eight matchups. BG won seven-straight contests before the teams battled to a 1-1 draw in this year's regular-season meeting in DeKalb (Oct. 16, 2021). The Falcons picked up a pair of one-goal wins (1-0 on the road, 2-1 in OT at Cochrane) in the spring of 2021. NIU's last victory over the Falcons was a 1-0 OT decision in BG on Oct. 3, 2015. The Falcons are 11-7-0 at home, 5-9-2 on the road and 1-1-0 in neutral-site matches vs. the Huskies over the years.
UP NEXT
• The BGSU-NIU winner advances to Sunday's (Nov. 14) MAC Tournament final, facing either Georgia State or West Virginia. The championship contest begins at 1:00 p.m. ET.
• The winner of Sunday's match will earn the MAC's automatic bid to the NCAA Championships.
# BGSU FALCON SOCCER #
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