The Bowling Green Falcons have returned home from Ann Arbor and are preparing for one of the biggest weeks of the season.
Who is in town this weekend? The Ohio Bobcats, as the Falcons start Mid-American Conference play in the 2023 homecoming game.
But as they returned home Saturday night, the team was a little banged up with injuries, most notably at the quarterback position.
Well who I am I kidding, they were REALLY banged up.
“I couldn’t tell you right now at a lot of positions where we’re at waiting to see who can heal, and who can’t,” said head coach Scot Loeffler at Monday’s press conference. “But the one thing I can assure you is the people that are in there, we’re going to have a really good game plan for, and I can promise you that they’re going to play their tails off.”
It was revealed that in the fourth quarter of the Eastern Illinois game, starting quarterback Connor Bazelak got injured, limiting his practice for the week leading up to Saturday and just hours before the kick at Michigan it was announced he would not play due to a calf injury.
This gave second string quarterback Camden Orth the start at the Big House, where we saw Orth go 8/11 for 91 yards and led the charge in getting the Falcons within one point of the Wolverines mid-way through the second quarter.
But then he left the field with an unknown injury and did not return to the game.
“You lost your second quarterback and then you’re dealing with a third that had really no reps whatsoever all week long,” Loeffler said.
That third string? Purdue transfer Hayden Tomisciek,who went 6/11 for 33 total yards and threw a pair of interceptions.
“You’re down to Hayden who was simulating JJ McCarthy all week, and for what he did considering the situation was pretty impressive,” Loeffler said.
But now the question remains: Who is going to start this Saturday.
Or more importantly, who is even going to be available?
“I really don’t want to get into either one of them (Orth, Bazelak), to be honest with you,” Loeffler said.
With all the injuries the Falcons suffered over the weekend, it left Loeffler to not practice Monday, in order to give his players the rest they need.
“We made a decision last night that there was no way that we could practice today, so we’re taking it day to day so were going to have to adapt and adjust,” said Loeffler. “We’ve got a lot of injured players right now, we were scheduled to practice today and we did not, and we’re gonna change every single thing we normally do in a game week and up just to one; be able to find out who can actually play.”
There are a lot of holes to fill on this team at this particular moment, especially at quarterback, but Loeffler can assure us one thing-
They’ll be ready
You’re going to find how tough you really are, so, but it starts this week, and we need to find a way,” Loeffler said.
Kickoff this Saturday for the 101st homecoming for Bowling Green begins at 3:30 p.m.
For more information related to BGSU Athletics, follow Falcon Media Sports Network on X (@bg_fmsn).
