BGSU men’s basketball (10-4, 1-1) fell to the only undefeated team in the Mid-American Conference (MAC), against the Miami (OH) RedHawks (14-0, 2-0) 93-83, for the Falcons’ first MAC loss of the year.
Bowling Green began the game with a 7-2 lead in the first minutes of play; this would be the largest and only lead the Falcons would have all game. Miami OH outscored the Falcons and ended the first half with a 54-28 lead.
“There was a 15-minute stretch in the first half where we just weren’t very good,” said head coach Todd Simon postgame. “We didn’t make shots, we had some good shots we didn’t make them, we turned it over, some uncharacteristic turnovers, when you play a good team you don’t have that margin for error.”
The Falcons shot 2/12 from three in the first half while the RedHawks shot 50% from beyond the arc, alongside shooting 63% from the field.
The Orange and Brown began the second half with a 6-0 run, with a Sam Towns dunk getting the score to 57-39. BG spent the entire second half trying to crawl its way back up the ladder to try and take the lead.
A three-point shot by Javon Ruffin cut the RedHawks lead to 12 points with 6:11 left in the game, but it was too little, too late, the Falcons falling to Miami 93-83 for their first MAC loss of the season.
The RedHawks dominated multiple aspects of the game, including rebounding, outrebounding the Falcons 34-28.
“It definitely hurts, rebounding is something I think our team tries to pride ourselves in, it’s definitely a downfall when we lose the rebounding battle by 10, I think we need to focus on that, especially with the rest of the MAC coming up,” said Towns.
Towns led the Falcons with 24 points, Javontae Campbell finished his night with 16 points, and Ruffin scored 12. Mayar Wol and Josiah Shackelford scored 14 and 10 points off the bench, respectively.
For Miami OH, both Peter Suder and Brant Byers scored 17 for the RedHawks, with four members of the Miami starting lineup scoring double-digit points.
The Falcons’ record falls to 10-4, and they’ll have to wait until next year before they can play against their next opponent, taking on UMass on Jan 3 at the Mullins Center, with tip-off at 2:00 p.m.
