CLEVELAND — An end-of-season slump lingered over Bowling Green’s men’s basketball team entering the
Mid-American Conference tournament on Thursday.
The Falcons picked the perfect time to find their rhythm.
After missing its first three free throws and quickly falling behind, three-seeded BG responded with a
12-2 run and erupted for its best offensive game of the season with a 99-86 quarterfinal win over No. 11
Ball State at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland.
“The shots that they were taking and making is 18-foot shots off the dribble. They’re not that easy of
shots, and they took a ton of these,” Ball State coach James Whitford said of BG.
“It was disappointing for us that we couldn’t get stops, but I want to give them great respect because I
thought they played — I didn’t feel like we played poorly. I thought we played pretty well.
“I thought Bowling Green played very, very well tonight.”
Bowling Green (21-11) advances to the MAC semifinals to play No. 7 Northern Illinois — which upset
two-seeded Toledo 80-76 in the early evening game — at approximately 9 p.m. back at the Q. BG beat NIU
87-67 less than a month ago on Feb. 16.
Ball State finished its season at 16-17.
Dylan Frye, who had seen his 3-point percentage plummet nearly 10 points in the final third of the
season, knocked down an early deep triple and later capped the 12-2 run with a step-back contested 3 in
front of BSU’s bench in the right corner.
“Just playing my game. I always trust my game. I may have been off a couple games, but that won’t stop me
from shooting the ball. I’ll always keep shooting and playing my game,” Frye said.
“Tonight Maj was setting great screens and getting me open on those 3s as well.
“I’m never going to lose confidence in my shot. Even if I’m off a couple games, it’s not going to stop
me.”
Frye, who had a game-high 16 points at the half, finished with 20 points for the first time since a win
over Central Michigan over a month ago.
Frye wasn’t the only Falcon who seemingly could do no wrong, as the team’s 99 points was a season-high.
Demajeo Wiggins, who had scored a combined five points over his past two games, aggressively worked the
post with confidence and spearheaded BG with 22 points and 11 rebounds. He had his 19th double-double of
the season.
Wiggins capped a 9-0 run late in the first half catching the ball on the right block, drop-stepping and
going up with a strong hook shot to push BG ahead 39-33 and force a BSU timeout.
Wiggins, who did not make a field goal in the schools’ regular season meeting, used the same strong
drop-step on either block much of the night finishing 9 of 11 from the floor.
“I was just trying to play my game. Jeff Uju, he just said go out, play your game, have fun, and you
know, everything just worked out for myself and also for the team,” Wiggins said. “So we were just going
out, we were playing hard, competing.”
Caleb Fields, a freshman who has started 23 of the past 24 games due to his on-ball defense, was tasked
with guarding all-league point guard Tayler Persons.
Persons scored 15 with six assists in the first half, but Fields helped contain him to 10 and 1 across
the final 20 minutes. Persons led with 25 points and seven assists with four turnovers.
Fields made noise on the other end of the floor, too.
The 6-foot-2 freshman pumped in 14 points, just his fourth time in double figures all season, including a
timely transition 3 to give BG a nine-point lead midway through the second half.
Fields’ triple snapped a two-and-a-half minute scoring drought.
“He’s been starting all year long for a reason. … he’s been starting because of his defense,” Huger said.
“He’s very good defensively, very active, can guard 1, 2 or 3 and he rebounds for his size.
“So had no problems with putting him on Persons. He’s been guarding basically the best players.”
Justin Turner, an all-MAC first-team selection and the Falcons’ leading scorer, played just five
first-half minutes after earning his second foul on an early flagrant-one. A late-game 3-pointer pushed
him to 10 points, giving him double figures in 30 of 32 games this season.
Daeqwon Plowden, who went 2 of 2 from deep, made multiple 3-pointers in a game for just the fourth time
this season. The 6-6 sophomore scored 10 with eight rebounds.
Antwon Lillard dumbed gasoline on the second-half fire with an animated two-handed dunk in transition.
Marlon Sierra also added a 3-pointer each.
BG finished 9 of 20 (45 percent) from deep and 37 of 66 (56.1 percent) from the field.
Trey Moses and Zach Gunn scored 12 apiece for the Cardinals. Ishmael El-Amin scored 11.
