This is just terrific. Thanks so much to all the players and coaches who worked hard to get this going. I know nothing's done yet, etc, but this is just really fun to watch and I'm so proud of this team.
Here's part of why. BG's first 3 MAC wins were kind of anomalies, in the sense that they were double-digit wins in conference play. You just rarely see that, even from the good teams. Noting that Buffalo played winless WMU last night, and the Bulls were up 2 with 5 minutes to play and only 4 inside of 2 minutes. Yes, they won by 9, but it was a battle and that's what you expect.
This was an old-school, MAC slugfest. Type of game that's played in a gym. It was tough with both sides playing stifling defense in the second half and the game coming down the wire. There were 44 fouls called. It was an absolute brawl. And BG came out ahead.
Remember, Ball State was picked to be at the top of the conference. They've won at Savage this year. They are a veteran team--#44 in experience in the country, according to kenpom. True, they have not won since leaving Savage Arena, but that's a well-coached team with veteran players and the game still went BG's way.
And, it was a game BG was more or less in control of. BG led for 32 minutes of the game. Ball State never led by more than 2. I think the result was the right result.
BG jumped out to a 14-5 lead and lead 29-19 with 8 left in the first half. Ball State scored 8 straight to cut it to 1 with 4:38 left and then a minute later had the game tied. For almost all of the rest of the game the lead was never higher than 6 and most of the time it was a one-possession game. The early second half was marked mostly by no one scoring. BG at one point was 1 of 18 from the field and Ball State was 2 and something. Some of it was missed shots but both teams were working hard on the defensive end.
BG was up 4 with the ball with 2 minutes left to play. Lillard missed a 3 and BSU raced down their floor. Plowden got a steal from Tayler Persons--one of the best guards in the MAC--and fed Lillard, who missed but Plowden had the offensive board and the put back and BG was up 6 with 1:21 left.
Back on the defensive end, BG got another steal, this team from Lillard, who was fouled on the other end and sunk 2 free throws. BG up 8 with 1:16 left, having played a winning and decisive minute of basketball in clutch time.
The Cardinals were not going away. Persons drew a foul on Plowden and made both FTs to cut it to 6 and then they hit a 3 off a Turner miss and it was down to 3 with :33 left.
Then, BG experienced an issue from the bad-old days, which is the inability to get the ball in-bound off the baseline in a clutch situation. Ball State was in a hair-on-fire defense mode. BG got the ball inbounds the first time, but threw it right in the corner and Frye had to get a bail-out timeout. The timeout didn't help, there was still nowhere to put the ball and BSU got the 5-second call.
So, that's a big turnaround. Now BSU has the ball under the basket down 3. This time, however, BG stayed poised and together, and got the stop on a 3-ball and Wiggins cleared the board and was fouled and he came down and hit both clutch FTs and BG was up 5 with :12 left.
Persons made a jumper to cut it back to 3 with :06 left. After a lengthy hissyfit from James Whitford (I assume over the possession arrow, but I don't know), BG got the ball in. This time, BSU had to foul right away, they got Frye with :05, he split the pair to put BG up 4 and Persons hit a buzzer beater to make the final margin 1.
Great game and a very good win for our team. BG scored 1.02 points per possession, the lowest of the winning streak. They allowed 1.01, which, as noted last time, is a winnable number.
In the local paper, Coach Whitford said that they wanted to make BG into a jump shooting team, and they certainly did that. You're not going to win many games where you get outshot like this. BG made 31% of its 2FGs, the lowest since NIU in the 2016 season. BG, however, did make 40% of its 3s for the 7th time in 8 games, so that helped to balance it out. BG got a couple possessions back on turnovers--including those two late steals--and dominated the boards against a good rebounding team. Finally, and probably most vital, BG had a very good game at the line, making 29 of 33 FTs, as opposed to BSU's 19 of 25. Without that FT shooting, Ball State probably gets the win. Ball State's shooting was the reverse of BG....they made 55% of their 2FGs and only 31% of their 3FGs.
Individually, Justin Turner had 20, which he has had for all the MAC games. He shot 7 of 17 and 3 of 6 and made all 3 of this FTs along with 3 assists and 3 turnovers.
BG has had success getting contributions from different guys. In this game, it was Daeqwon Plowden, who has been pretty silent over the past few games. In this one, he had a career game, scoring 19 in 27 minutes. He was 4 of 7 and 3 of 5, 8 of 10 at the line, 8 rebounds and 2 steals. Antwon Lillard scored 15 on 4 of 12 and 1 of 5 shooting--so not the most efficient night--to go with 6-6 at the line, 4 rebounds and 2 steals. Dylan Frye scored 10 on 3 of 9 shooting and 1 of 4 shooting, 3 of 4 at the line and 2 steals.
Demajeo Wiggins is continuing to be challenged on the offensive end. He's getting swarmed when he has the ball, he couldn't back down on Moses and it looks to me like he's not always strong with the ball. He was 0 of 7 from the field with 3 turnovers, so 10 possessions. He still contributed though. He made 7 of 8 at the line and had 15 boards, putting him over 900 on his career.
He's had 0 FGs in 2 of the last 3 games and is 2-17 in that span. I think it's clear that teams are determined to keep him from beating them, which is fine if BG can use the space to make them pay for that decision. You can bet that WMU will continue to play Wiggins very tough--they are typically among the most physical teams in the MAC.
BG tried to go without him, but I think you could see that BG just doesn't have another true 5 to matchup with inside players like BSU has.
Anyway, it was a hard-fought victory for BG. Winless WMU is coming in Saturday in the midst of a predicted winter storm. WMU will not lay down. No chance.
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