Bowling Green first year coach Fred Chmiel talks to forward Keiryn McGuff during the first half of an exhibition game against Purdue Northwest on Thursday at the Stroh Center in Bowling Green, Ohio. Bowling Green defeated Purdue Northwest 82-42. (Scott W. Grau/BGSU Athletics)
The Bowling Green State University women’s basketball team led from wire to wire on Thursday evening, rolling along to an 82-43 win over Purdue University Northwest in exhibition play at the Stroh Center.
It was BGSU first-year coach Fred Chmiel’s debut game.
Lexi Fleming scored 20 points to lead four double-digit scorers for the Falcons, while Sophie Dziekan added 12 points and freshmen Taya Ellis and Paige Kohler 11 and 10, respectively. Ellis had a double-double, with a game-high 10 rebounds.
In all, eight different Falcons scored five or more points, with seven players recording at least one assist.
Abbie Riddle had eight points and was a perfect 2-for-2 from the three-point line, while both Jasmine Clerkley and Emily Siesel scored seven points.
Olivia Hill scored five points and added six rebounds and three steals, while Keiryn McGuff had two points and six boards. Dziekan had six rebounds – all at the offensive end of the floor – and added three assists and three steals, with Kohler amassing five boards, four assists and three steals.
Fleming, who earlier on Thursday was named to the Preseason All-Mid-American Conference Team, scored the Falcons’ first seven points as BGSU built an early lead. The Falcons led by nine after the first quarter and 18 at the half, then outscored the Pride by a 23-6 count in the third period.
In the first quarter, Fleming took a pass from Olivia Hill and knocked down a three-point try, then converted a pair of layups, including one off of a steal by Hill. Hill put back a missed shot before Kohler’s floater made it an 11-2 game.
A 5-0 run by the visitors cut the BG lead to 16-9, but a layup by Ellis began a 5-0 run for the Falcons, capped by Fleming’s steal and layup.
In the second quarter, Dziekan kicked the ball out to Emily Siesel for a three-pointer on the first possession of the quarter, giving the Falcons a 25-13 lead. The Pride whittled that lead down to seven points, before Kohler found Fleming for a corner three.
Siesel picked the pocket of a PNW point guard and sailed in for a layup, and moments later, Kohler’s driving layup began a 10-0 run for the Falcons. Ellis scored five points during that stretch, with her putback giving the hosts a 40-22 lead.
The final bucket of the half came on a highlight-reel play, as Kohler’s long pass found Fleming streaking along the baseline. Fleming caught the pass and laid it off to a cutting Dziekan for a layup and a 42-24 lead at the half.
Jasmine Clerkley scored six of the Falcons’ first eight points after halftime, capped by a nifty turnaround jump shot off of Abbie Riddle’s feed, and Hill’s layup put BG up, 52-27.
Riddle found Fleming for a corner three, and after a three-point play by Dziekan, Fleming returned to the corner, took a Siesel pass and knocked down another triple try. A Fleming floater completed a 13-0 run that gave the Falcons a 65-28 lead late in the quarter.
Ellis put back a missed shot, and free throws by Ellis and Clerkley gave the Falcons a 39-point lead early in the final quarter.
BG played the inside-out game, and Riddle took a Dziekan pass and knocked down a shot from the arc, and another Riddle triple, this time from a Keiryn McGuff assist, made it a 78-40 game with 90 seconds to go.
The regular season begins on Tuesday, when Cleveland State comes to the Stroh Center. The Falcons (31) and Vikings (30) combined to win 61 games last season. Tipoff is set for 6 p.m.
