Falcon women drop Findlay

BOWLING GREEN, Ohio - There is a reason exhibition games are on the schedule.

For the Bowling Green women’s basketball team, that was clearly evident Wednesday night at Anderson Arena.

Even though the Falcons easily defeated Division II opponent Findlay, 80-50, they never truly got into a flow with a host of new faces on the floor.

16 players played in the game for BG, including six newcomers. The lack of cohesiveness was obvious, granted it was the first time the Falcons faced an opposing team this season.

“That’s what exhibition games are for,” said BG head coach Curt Miller.

The five-time defending Mid-American Conference champions, BG did have solid performances from transfers Maggie Hennegan and Tamika Nurse, and 15 of 16 players that saw time scored for the Falcons.

Hennegan, a 6-foot redshirt junior forward from St. Louis University, nearly had a double-double in the first half and finished with 14 points and 12 rebounds.

“It was great to be in Anderson Arena and in a uniform out there with the team. I just can’t wait to do it again,” said Hennegan, who had 10 points and eight rebounds in the first half. “I thought there were some solid things that I did but there’s definitely some areas that I need to improve on.”

Nurse, a 5-8, fifth-year senior from the University of Oregon, also had 14 points while making 8-of-11 free throws. The speedy point guard was able to drive to the basket numerous times off defensive rebounds, sprinting the ball down the court before Findlay’s defense could catch up.

“We outletted the ball a lot to Tamika to create tempo and obviously you see how fast she is,” Miller said. “She can create havoc in transition and that’s one of her strong points.”

Reigning Mid-American Conference player of the year Lauren Prochaska did not start due to not being fully recovered from the flu and mononucleosis. She played 16 minutes off the bench, finishing with 9 points on 2-of-4 shooting and made all four of her free throws.

“She was in fantastic shape and the flu-bug combined with the mono really has set her back,” said Miller. “We’re getting her back in gradually. I played her a little bit longer than I had planned because I just wanted to see what her conditioning level was at.

“It won’t happen overnight but we’ll get Lauren back to 100 percent here as quickly as we can.”

Four freshmen saw time for BG, as Jessie Tamerlano (North Royalton), Allison Papenfuss (Anthony Wayne), Chrissy Steffen (Carmel, Ind.) and Simone Eli (Genoa) combined for 13 points and 12 rebounds.

Papenfuss finished with four points and four boards in seven minutes while Steffen scored five points and four rebounds in 13 minutes.

“I think that Papenfuss can really impact us this year at some point,” Miller said. “Chrissy Steffen has a great future here.”

One of the main points of concern from the game was BG’s lack of rebounding. The Falcons out-rebounded Findlay by a slim 43-39 margin and allowed 17 offensive rebounds, which is something that hurt BG greatly last season.

“We gave up entirely too many second chances,” Miller said. “So rebounding remains a concern and an Achilles’ heel for this program.”

Another point of emphasis the Falcons will need to work out is the distribution of minutes on a team filled with depth.

“Where we can steal minutes from is the question. There’s just a lot depth on this team and that’s a good problem, but it’s also hard to figure out how many minutes everyone is going to get and try to keep everyone happy,” Miller said. “We’re going to have to fall into roles this year ... Ultimately some people are going to have to understand that there’s just not enough minutes to go around.”

There was a total of 49 personal fouls called in the game, and BG attempted 39 free throws, making 30 (77 percent).

(The Sentinel-Tribune newspaper is a FOX Toledo News media partner)