BGSU men’s basketball (7-14, 2-7) dropped their fifth straight game on Saturday night, falling 90-71 to Central Michigan (10-11, 4-5) in Mount Pleasant.
BG kept it close early, staying within two points of the Chippewas for the first seven minutes, but a Cayden Vasko 3-pointer with 12:48 left in the first half gave CMU a five-point lead that continued to grow as the period progressed.
The Chippewas’ lead grew to eight heading into the first TV timeout, where Bowling Green began to battle back, cutting the lead back down to five, thanks to DaJion Humphrey converting an and-one attempt.
The lead stayed between four and eight points for the next three minutes before Trey Thomas drilled a triple to bring the Falcons back within two with 8:09 remaining in the half.
After a quick 5-2 scoring run by CMU, the two teams traded misses, going scoreless until Kyler Vanderjagt sank a triple with a touch over six minutes to go to put Central Michigan back up by eight.
The Chippewas went back to Vanderjagt, creating space for him inside to sink a two-pointer to extend their lead to double digits for the first time of the night.
After some more back-and-forth, CMU entered the halftime break with a 16-point advantage.
Out of the intermission, Bowling Green found their stride, going on an 18-8 run over the first six minutes of the half, thanks in part to Marcus Johnson, who had one-third of the team’s points over the stretch.
With the lead at 57-51 in favor of Central Michigan, neither team could buy a bucket for almost two minutes of game time, until Central Michigan’s Ugnius Jarusevicius ended the drought on a free throw with 12:06 on the clock.
Following the free throw, Vanderjagt hit another trey to balloon the lead back out to 10.
Over the next few minutes, the Chips unleashed a barrage of 3-pointers on the Falcons, growing their lead to as large as 24 points.
Bowling Green was able to bring it back down to 19 points before the final buzzer sounded.
Vanderjagt paced the game in scoring with 25 points on an extremely efficient 8-for-10 shooting night, hitting six of his seven three pointers, while Javonte Campbell led the visiting Falcons with 17 points.
The loss knocks the Falcons all the way down to 10th place in the conference, ahead of only Buffalo (who BG holds the head-to-head tiebreaker over) and Northern Illinois, who only have one conference win this season.
With tournament time around the corner, the Falcons are in desperate need of a miracle.
Eastern Michigan (10-11, 4-5), who has the tiebreaker over Bowling Green, currently holds the eighth and final seed in the conference tournament, meaning the Falcons are currently three games out of the last spot in the tournament.
Of BG’s nine remaining games, five of them are at the Stroh Center (Northern Illinois, Ohio, Kent State, Ball State, Western Michigan).
However, with a record of just 5-5 at home, nothing is guaranteed for Bowling Green down the stretch.
BGSU will have their next opportunity to get into the win column for the first time since Jan. 14 on Feb. 4 when Northern Illinois comes to town. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m.
Falcon Media Sports Network’s Tyler Kavalecz and Ben Corak will be on the call, beginning at 6:45 p.m. for pregame on Falcon Radio.
