The UB women's basketball team was a bright spot in a difficult year for UB's major sports. On Tuesday March 4, UB and Kent State met in their final regular season game with a possible East Division title on the line. It would have been the first division title in modern team history for Buffalo.
The final game of the regular season. Two of the top teams in the division waging war. The Mid-American Conference East title on the line. A raucous crowd. Emotions running wild.
This is what college basketball is all about.
With the Miami (Ohio) and Marshall game - a game with MAC East implications for Kent State and Buffalo - being played simultaneously, the Flashes were able to edge out the Bulls by a score of 78-72 in front of a boisterous crowd of 1,328 at Alumni Arena on Tuesday, March 4.
"We were on a six-game winning streak, but it's better to lose now than next week," said UB's senior guard Kate McMeeken-Ruscoe. "You can learn more from your losses than your wins. We can concentrate on what's wrong and try to fix that."
With Miami's defeat of Marshall, the relevance of the game to the division title was lost, as the RedHawks were able to clinch the MAC East title with their overtime win. Nevertheless, Buffalo and Kent State duked it out in front of the 13th biggest crowd ever for a women's basketball game at UB with MAC Tournament seedings on the line. Had UB won, they would have been seeded fourth and played last-place Akron in the first round.
The game was still in doubt with 9:07 left after a Kim Kilpela free throw tied it at 56, but a Golden Flash wave was about to douse UB's aspirations for a first round bye and their seventh consecutive victory.
"This was a must-win game for us," said KSU head coach Bob Lindsay. "I think the difference in the game was that we made a few more plays than they did, and that was really the bottom line. We happen to play well here, for us it's fortunate."
From that point, Kent State went on an 8-0 run, which was capped off by a Morgan O'Hara 3-pointer that put the game at 64-56 with 6:33 remaining in the game.
