Despite the Bulls’ success this season, there still remains one team ahead of them in the Mid-American Conference: the Central Michigan Chippewas. The Chippewas are currently first in the MAC and have been perfect in conference play this season. They are the last team to beat the Bulls, having a 86-79 win back in January.
Saturday's win marked the second straight game where the Bulls held their opponent to less than 50 points.
Men’s Basketball (16-6, 8-1 MAC) The Bulls have looked like killers in the MAC so far this season. Despite a recent close loss to Kent State (12-10, 6-3 MAC), the Bulls have won nine of their last 10 games. Seven of those wins were by 10 points or more. The team started the season with some impressive individual performances, but now the Bulls have been playing on a more consistent level.
Men’s Basketball (15-4, MAC 9-7) The Men’s Basketball team lost the annual blackout game on Friday 89-83 to the Akron Zips (23-6, MAC 13-3). The game drew a large crowd because of the hype around the team and the free t-shirts.
Men’s basketball (13-12, 7-5 Mid-American Conference) Buffalo’s men’s basketball team continued its win streak this week when they picked up two more victories against the Northern Illinois Huskies and Bowling Green Falcons.
UB men’s basketball defeated Ball State (15-8, 6-4) 96-69 Friday in a nationally televised game at Worthen Arena. It was the third straight game in which the Bulls scored 90 points, the first time they have done that since the ’94-’95 season.
Women’s basketball (15-5, 5-4 Mid-American Conference) After starting the season hot and jumping out to a 10-0 start, the Buffalo Bulls women’s team faced their first taste of defeat this season when they fell to Harvard 74-62 in their second game after Christmas.
The Bulls bring in three players for next season – one transfer and two high school seniors. University of Massachusetts guard Cierra Dillard joins high school seniors Theresa Onwuka and Summer Hemphill for the recruiting class. Head coach Felisha Legette-Jack said the new recruits bring another dimension to the roster that was lacking at times last season: athleticism.
On Monday, students, media, alumni and fans gathered in the Student Union for a rally to celebrate both teams’ conference tournament championships and NCAA Tournament appearances. Players, coaches and President Satish Tripathi were present, while members of the administration, including Athletic Director Allen Greene, were not present due to a planned vacation.
The next question: Where can the Bulls go from here?
My first reaction was shock that Buffalo, fresh off a successful conference tournament run, could look barley competitive. Then I stopped and remembered just how far this team had come from the start of the regular season – how we started to see some of its strengths and how players you didn’t know about five months ago stepped up in moments you could’ve never imagined. I remembered this team is ahead of schedule.
Head coach Felisha Legette-Jack took Friday's loss as a learning experience for both her and the team.
The surprising upstart Bulls (20-13, 8-10 Mid-American Conference) want to see just how good they really are – and what better way to do that than beating one of the top teams in the country like Ohio State?
Felisha Legette-Jack is without question the most intense coach on UB’s campus. It’s hard not to leave one of her Buffalo women’s basketball practices or postgame interviews – where she is always both animated, passionate and even a little intimidating – not feeling a little motivated yourself, even if you’re from being a Division-I women’s basketball player. So when Legette-Jack said she wanted to build “the village” or community of support to help grow her young Bulls team this season – it was hard to dismiss it as the campy and cliché coach speak that it would be if 99 percent of coaches said it.
The Bulls (20-13, 8-10 Mid-American Conference) were awarded a No. 14 seed in the Sioux Falls Region and will face No. 3 seed Ohio State (24-7, 15-3 Big Ten).
The No. 8 seed Bulls (20-13, 8-10 MAC) defeated No. 2 seed Central Michigan (22-12, 14-4 MAC) 73-71 in overtime of the MAC Tournament Championship game in Cleveland, Ohio Saturday.
The Buffalo women’s basketball team is one win away from making ts first-ever NCAA Tournament appearance. Behind its best offensive performance in conference play this season, the No. 8 seed Bulls (19-13, 8-10 Mid-American Conference) continued its Cinderella run Friday by defeating No. 5 seed Akron (19-13, 11-7 MAC) 88-87 in a highly contested MAC Tournament Semifinals in Cleveland, Ohio.
Six members of the UB basketball programs – two from the women’s squad and four from the men – were honored with Mid-American Conference accolades on Monday, highlighted by junior guard Joanna Smith’s selection to the All MAC First-Team.
No. 8 seed Buffalo defeated No. 9 seed Bowling Green (10-18, 6-12) in a first round campus-site matchup on Monday to advance to the quarterfinals against the Bobcats on Wednesday in Cleveland, Ohio.
The No. 8-seeded Bulls (17-13, 8-10 MAC) defeated No. 9 seed Bowling Green (10-18, 6-12 MAC) for the third time this season, 60-44, in the first round of the MAC Tournament at Alumni Arena on Monday. The Bulls are now headed to Cleveland for the second round to play No. 1 Ohio (24-5, 16-2 MAC), which they defeated twice this season. The Bulls are winners of two straight and have won five of six overall.
Solutions by The State News
