Retaining her flawless 4-0 record against the Central Michigan Chippewas may have been on UB head coach Cheryl Dozier's mind on Wednesday night in Alumni Arena, but that thought was certainly not in the same stratosphere as her main objective: getting her maligned squad another Mid-American Conference victory.
Luckily for Dozier, she was able to do just that as Buffalo pulled off a 57-52 defeat of CMU.
The Bulls (4-10, 2-2 MAC) followed their rallying cry of "defense" throughout the entire game, and it showed. They caused 15 turnovers, and held Central Michigan's shooting to 29.6 percent for the game.
The Chippewas (4-12, 0-5 MAC) did not let their poor shooting discourage them, and they played a tough game, dominating the offensive glass.
"They gave us everything they've got," said Dozier after the game. "I knew coming into this game tonight that they were going to come in wanting to get this victory, because of the fact that it only takes one to get them back on a roll."
UB shot well enough to get the win, hitting 42.9 percent from the field. But it was their outstanding 57.1 percent from beyond the arc separated them from CMU. Brooke Meunier found the holes in Central Michigan's defense early, as she scored 14 of her 18 points in the first half, including hitting 3-of-4 from three-point land.
"I had mine in the first half," said Meunier. "They weren't playing me on the three and I was shooting pretty good on the three, so I just kept shooting."
Senior Jessica Kochendorfer scored 18 points as well, but most of those came from under the rim.
"I got a lot of my points in a five minute stretch in the first half, in the post, basically, they weren't playing much post defense," said Kochendorfer after the game.
Kochendorfer shot 6 of 10 from the field and hit all five free throws that she took.
Although the Bulls had the first half lead, Central Michigan was breathing on UB's collective neck several times late in the second half. The score was 55-49 in favor of Buffalo when Erin Kuhl hit a 3-pointer for the Chippewas with just 23 seconds left on the clock, but the Bulls were able to hit key free throws down the stretch when they had to.
Allison Bennett iced the game with eight straight points to put the Bulls ahead for good in the last two minutes of the game.
If there is one aspect that is imperative for the Bulls to improve, it is their rebounding. With 8:49 remaining in the second half, the Chippewas got a second and third chance with great offensive rebounding.
Dozier could be heard yelling from the Bulls bench, "This is my worst nightmare."
"When you get a stat sheet and you get out-rebounded 39-28 and you gave the other team 24 offensive rebounds, it is a coaches worst nightmare," Dozier said. "We weren't rebounding out of our zone, we weren't rebounding out of our man-to-man. We just were not rebounding."
Rebounding is going to be a fundamental focus of the Bulls play in the future, and that future is coming up this Saturday against Ball State.
"We definitely need to rebound a lot better," said Kochendorfer. "We gave up way too many offensive rebounds, but if we keep playing defense the way we do, and if we shoot well and our offense is coming together a lot better and we just have to rebound better."
This leaves one question: could Buffalo win against the 9-8 (4-2 MAC) Ball State Cardinals if they play the same exact game that they did in the win against CMU?
"No," said Dozier. "We've got to rebound the basketball better. Ball State is an athletic team. Tthey are a team that can score a lot of points. You cannot give a team that has that much offensive fire power 24 more opportunities at the basket."
UB plays at 1 p.m. this Saturday in Ball State's Worthen Arena.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
