Freshman guard Kirsten Lewis-Williams scored a layup to kick off the fourth quarter, giving the Bulls (16-10, 9-6 MAC) a 44-34 lead. After a defensive stop, redshirt senior Chellia Watson hit a three-pointer to give UB a 13-point lead, sealing the Bulls’ victory over the Bowling Green Falcons (14-12, 8-7 MAC).
The Bulls won 70-55 over the Bowling Green Falcons on Wednesday night at the Stroh Center in Ohio. The win officially kept UB in the No. 4 seed in the Mid-American Conference (MAC) standings, dropping the Falcons into fifth after the two teams were tied record-wise.
If the standings remain the same heading into the MAC playoffs, the Bulls will face Bowling Green again in the first round of the tournament.
UB clamped down defensively, holding the Falcons to 38.6% from the field and just 28% from beyond the arc. Bowling Green’s senior forward Erika Porter shot a perfect 10-for-10 from the field, but outside of Porter, the Bulls held the rest of the team to a dismal 25% from the field. UB shot a blistering 47% from the three-point line and forced the Falcons into 14 turnovers.
Watson, seventh in the country in scoring with 23.2 points per game, led the team with 20 points. Senior guard Rana Elhusseini contributed 16 points, adding eight rebounds and five assists in an all-around effort. Freshman guard Kirsten Lewis-Williams notched 14 points and five assists, making her the third Bull to score double digits.
The Bulls led 16-10 at the end of the first quarter after Elhusseini hit a three-pointer, but Bowling Green battled back to keep things close in the second. The Falcons got as close as 3 points, trailing 24-27 with 56 seconds left. After Elhusseini got her own rebound from a missed layup, she found sophomore guard Hattie Ogden, who scored a layup to give the Bulls a 5-point lead going into halftime.
UB struggled to put Bowling Green away for most of the third quarter, but turned it on to close the frame with a 8-2 run. The Falcons fought back again, cutting the lead to 7 points with six minutes to play. From there, UB dominated on both ends of the ball, leading by as many as 18 points as they secured the victory.
The Bulls will next face Kent State (17-8, 12-3 MAC) away on Saturday. Tip-off is set for 1 p.m. The game can be streamed on ESPN+.
Henry Daley is an assistant sports editor and can be reached at henry.daley@ubspectrum.com
Henry Daley is an assistant sports editor at The Spectrum. His work has featured on other platforms such as Medium and Last Word on Sports. Outside of the newspaper, he enjoys running and watching sports (when he’s not writing about them).
