BGSU women’s basketball (3-4) secured its first home win of the season at the Stroh Center against the Purdue Fort Wayne Mastodons (4-4), winning 56-53 on Sunday.
“Fort Wayne is a really good team. They can really stretch the floor, have some perimeter shooters, while playing hard,” said head coach Fred Chmiel. “All in all, a win is a win, and it’s fantastic to be home.”
The Falcons’ first quarter was electric, scoring 19 points to begin the game. Junior guard Paige Kohler and sophomore guard Johnea Donahue managed to identify open players inside the paint and beyond the three-point line for easy buckets. BG shot an efficient 50% from the floor in the opening quarter.
Yet, the Orange and Brown season struggles offensively reappeared as the Mastodons quickly solved BG’s weaknesses, as they forced the Falcons to only five points in the second quarter. Bowling Green managed to shoot 14.3% from the hardwood in the second quarter, including only making one triple out of six attempts.
“In the first quarter, I thought we did a great job of moving the basketball and the ball found who needed to shoot it,” said Chmiel. “I thought in the second quarter, we were taking two dribbles too many out of our sets. We were losing those shooting windows. We didn’t get ahead of the possession, and the defense [Fort Wayne] was always catching up to our next movement, so we were easy to guard when that happened.”
Even with Kohler leading the Falcons in total points scored with 15 on the afternoon, she shot 29% from the field, going 5-17. Donahue finished the game, scoring 12 points, but she was more efficient, shooting 50% from the floor.
BGSU’s shot efficiency increased after halftime; however, as a team, Bowling Green’s field goal percentage was at 37.5% after the conclusion of both the third and fourth quarters. Having said that, the Orange and Brown were 4-17 from downtown in the second half, which contributed to the lack of scoring.
“We changed it up in the third quarter, got back to the first quarter movement,” said Chmiel. “And then we made some critical shots in the fourth quarter, so pretty proud of our effort, but our shooting does need to improve.”
Ball movement was one of the positives following the win, which proved to be key in today’s win against Purdue Fort Wayne. Bowling Green finished the game having tallied 13 assists while the Mastodons only managed seven assists.
Additionally, BG can hang their head high knowing as a team they combined for 11 second chance opportunities against Purdue Fort Wayne.
“When you’re shooting 35% from the field and 20% from the three-point line, second chance points are critical,” said Chmiel. “You know, we got 11 of them off 13 rebounds, and I think we could add more.”
Now, BGSU will focus its sights on its next opponent, Kentucky State, as that game will be played this upcoming Wednesday at the Stroh Center at 7:00 p.m.
Falcon Media Sports Network will have full coverage of the match on bgfalconmedia.com.
