Katie Shumate (14) led Flashes with career-high 27 points. Lindsey Thall (44) had a career-high 12 rebounds in 96-86 win over Bowling Green. (File photo by Liam Morrison from Stater/KentWired.)

Kent State’s women spotted Bowling Green a 19-point lead in the first quarter, then battled back to beat the Falcons 96-86 in double overtime Saturday.

The Flashes scored at the buzzer of the first overtime to tie the game, then scored the first 11 points in the second overtime.

The win ties Kent State for third place in the MAC with Ohio, which lost its third straight game, 63-62 to Buffalo. Kent plays the Bobcats Wednesday at the M.A.C. Center. Both teams are 10-6 with two games to go in the regular season. KSU is 17-10 overall.

Five KSU players scored at least 12 points, led by freshman guard Katie Shumate with a career-high 27. Megan Carter had 21 points, nine rebounds and seven assists.

Lindsey Thall scored 15 and had a career-high 12 rebounds, along with three 3-point baskets and two blocks. Asiah Dingle also had 15 and six steals. Hannah Young had 12 with two 3-pointers and four rebounds.

“We got punched in the mouth in the first quarter and then kept chipping away,” coach Todd Starkey said in postgame media interviews. “We weren’t making anything early and weren’t getting any offensive rebounds.”

“I didn’t yell them at the end of the first quarter,” Starkey said. “I didn’t yell at them at halftime. I just said, ‘Listen. This is something you’re going to have to make a decision on. There’s no easy way out. You’re going to have to fight the rest of the way to even have a chance.'”

The key play of game came at the end of the first overtime. Kent State inbounded the ball in in front of its bench, trailing 83-81 with four seconds left. The pass went to Katie Shumate about seven feet from the basket. She turned to drive, then saw Nila Blackford alone under the basket. Blackford made the shot, her only basket of the game.

Here’s a 👀 at Nila Blackford’s basket that sent us to 2OT.#GoFlashes⚡ pic.twitter.com/9YbaUPamtR

— Kent State Women’s Basketball (@KentStWBB) February 29, 2020

 

“I’d like to say that exact action was what we drew up,” Starkey said. “But we wanted to get the ball into Katie and let her to make a play. She just made a great pass, and — you know — good players make good plays down the stretch.”

Shumate said she broke off her first option.

“I wasn’t open,” she told KSU radio broadcaster David Wilson. “So I posted up. Nila came open down low, and it’s perfect timing.”

On Shumate’s way to 27 points, which were three above her previous high, she made eight of her 15 shots, three-of-five 3-point attempts and eight-of-eight free throws. She had three assists and six rebounds in 45 minutes on the court.

Carter came close to her second straight double-double with 21 points and nine rebounds. She also had a career-high seven assists.

Dingle’s six steals match her career high. She set the tone for the second overtime when she stole the ball on Bowling Green’s first possession and drove the length of the court for a layup. “Those steals were huge,” Starkey said.

Thall’s 12 rebounds were three more than her previous high and eight above her season average. She also had three steals.

The six periods — counting the two overtimes — were almost like six different games.

First quarter: A truly ghastly start

Bowling Green made its first three shots and two free throws to take a 9-0 lead. It got as bad as 23-4 as BG made nine of 15 shots and three-of-four 3-pointers, all by   Caterrion Thompson. Kent State struggled to three-of 21 shooting and missed all five of its 3-point attempts. It was 25-8 at the end of the quarter.

“You hate to start a game like that,” Shumate said. “We just had to move on and play the next play and not think about what just happened and just chip away, stick together as a team, not let us get down.”

Second quarter: Flipping the script

The Falcons pushed their lead back up to 33-14 with six minutes to go in the first half, but then Kent State found its game. The Flashes went on a 10-0 run and finished by outscoring BG 11-7. The Flashes made nine-of-14 shots and five-of-10 three-pointers. In the second quarter, Shumate had 12 points, Young eight and Carter seven. Halftime: 39-35.

“I think we just hit some shots,” Shumate said. “And our energy got back up, and we started playing harder and more connected.”

Third quarter: Taking the lead

Bowling Green scored the first four points to push its lead to nine. But two minutes later, Thall hit a 3, then hit another 3 a minute later. A minute after that, Carter hit a jumper to give KSU its first lead, 50-49. Thall then hit another 3 and Kent State led 55-51 at the end of the quarter. The Flashes made eight-of-15 shots and four-of-eight 3-pointers. Thall scored 12 points.

Fourth quarter: Down to the wire

The Falcons took the lead back at 60-59 with 5:28 to go, the Kent scored and the teams were within four points for the rest of the quarter. Kadie Hempfling had a jumper with 14 seconds to go to tie the game. Carter missed a jumper with a second to go. 72-72.

Overtime 1: Looking bleak

The teams were within two points of each other the entire quarter. Morgan McMillen hit one foul shot with four seconds to play but missed the second. KSU called timeout, advanced the ball to the front court, and Shumate and Blackford did their thing to extend the game another five minutes 83-83.

Overtime 2: All Kent State

After Carter started things with her steal and score, Kent State ran off nine points more in a row. Bowling Green turned the ball over four times and missed six of its seven shots in the quarter.

Welcome to March

“I’m excited for this young team and what they’ve put themselves in position to do,” Starkey said. “So now we have to erase Bowling Green on our whiteboard and write it Ohio and but focused on a very talented Ohio team.

“It’s the last day of February. Now it’s March madness, and we’ve ushered it in.”

Box score

 

Mariah Modkins (5) and Asiah Dingle (3) combined to hold Bowling Green’s Madisen Parker to three shots and zero points. Parker had been the second-leading 3-point shooter in the country. (Photo by Nick Cammett from KSU Twitter feed.)

Kent State’s defense — not its strength for most of the season — looked championship caliber Wednesday.

The Flashes held Bowling Green, the second-best shooting team in the MAC, to 32% from the floor and 23% from 3-point distance in its 61-47 victory at the M.A.C. Center Wednesday. That’s:

• 11 percentage points below Bowling Green’s average in league play.
• BG’s second-lowest percentages of the season in both field goals and 3-point shooting.
• Seven percentage points better than Kent State’s defensive average and 19 percentage points below its 3-point defensive average.
• The lowest percentage a Division I opponent has shot against KSU this season, and second-lowest 3-point percentage.

Bowling Green’s 47 points was its lowest of the season. It’s the second fewest Kent State has allowed and the fewest scored against the Flashes by a Division I team. (Division III Hiram scored 36.)

The victory ended the Flashes’ first half of the MAC season at 5-4 and in a tie with Toledo for fourth place. They are 12-8 overall. Bowling Green is 1-8 in the MAC and 8-13 overall.

“Our defense was our backbone today, which was nice to see,” coach Todd Starkey said. “It hasn’t been a lot of the year.”

Bowling Green’s Madisen Parker went into the game making 47% of her 3-point attempts, second best in the country. She didn’t score. Kent State limited her to three shots, only one of them a 3-point attempt, in 32 minutes. KSU point guards Mariah Modkins and Asiah Dingle smothered Parker defensively. The plan, Starkey said, was:

“Crowd her on every catch. Make sure we have our hands over the ball.”

“Mariah was our first line of defense,” the coach said. “She had one of her best defensive games since she’s been here. When Asiah came in, she picked up right where Mariah left off.”

BG forward Angela Parker had been making 60% of her field-goal attempts, best in the conference. She made only four of 11 Wednesday. Lindsey Thall, Kent’s 6-2 sophomore forward, did much of the defense on Parker.

“I had to work every single possession, just banging it against her every time, not giving up anything easy,” Thall said.

Starkey said it was a two-part effort.

“We wanted to make sure we had great ball pressure so that they couldn’t make easy entry passes,” he said. “And we talked about with Lindsey about how she was just going to have to battle all game. She did a really good job of limiting Perry’s touches.”

Thall played one of her best games on offense and defense. She led the Flashes with 19 points, her most since scoring 32 against Ohio State in November. She had seven rebounds, her second highest of the season and blocked four shots, including two of Perry’s. She added two assists.

“She played 36 minutes,” Starkey said. “She really limited Perry’s looks. She had 19 points, seven rebounds. That’s a heck of a basketball game.”

Thall made three of six 3-point shots, which is her specialty. But she scored 10 of her points inside. She scored nine on close-in shots Saturday against Toledo.

“One of the things we’ve tried to do with Lindsey is to try to get her touches at different places on the court rather than just the 3-point line,” Starkey said. “Teams are dong a good job of defending her there, switching off guards on her. So we’re trying to get her touches in the paint so teams can’t do that.”

7:31 4Q | Kent State 52, BG 34

Mariah Modkins finds Lindsey Thall for an 18-point lead. Timeout BG. pic.twitter.com/BZinf0y2Z0

— Kent State Women’s Basketball (@KentStWBB) February 6, 2020

Dingle also played well on defense and offense. Back from a two-game suspension, she scored 16 points, had two assists and two steals. Dingle made seven of nine shots. That 78% is her best ever against a Division I team. (She made eight of nine against Hiram.) “She did a phenomenal job of finishing today,” Starkey said. “And at a really critical time, came up with a phenomenal offensive rebound on a scramble and stuck it back in.”

2:36 3Q | Kent State 43, BG 30

Asiah Dingle with back-to-back layups as the Flashes have largest lead of the night. pic.twitter.com/boTtettoSM

— Kent State Women’s Basketball (@KentStWBB) February 6, 2020

Dingle also had a spectacular defensive play when she knocked the ball away from the BG guard bringing the ball up court, then dove on the floor to push it away again.   The BG player lay on the floor as officials called a turnover for not getting the ball across half court in 10 seconds.

“We let her loose,” Starkey said. “Every now and then, if she’s not in foul trouble and we have a favorable matchup, we’ll say, ‘Asiah, go get her.’ And her eyes light up.”

And as Starkey was talking, Dingle’s eyes lit up.

Cutting the turnovers, stepping up the defense

Kent State trailed 28-27 at halftime, mostly because BG scored nine points off of the 12 turnovers the Flashes committed in the first half. Kent State barely averages 14 turnovers per game and had just seven against Toledo.

“We really focused on that at halftime,” Starkey said. “We can’t have empty possessions. So the guards did a really good job in the second half of cleaning that up.”

Kent had six turnovers in the second half and outscored the Falcons 8-4 off turnovers.

Another thing the Flashes emphasized starting the second half strong.

“We had to make sure that we didn’t come out flat the way did against Toledo,” Starkey said.

The Flashes were the opposite of flat. They outscored Bowling Green 18-4 in the third quarter, holding BG to two of 17 shooting.

Box score

The view from Bowling Green

Coach Robyn Fralick, quoted on the team’s website:

“I thought our defensive effort was really good, especially in the first half. Our third quarter was where the game was lost, so we’ve got to figure out how to fix that and move forward.”

Notes

• Nila Blackford had a career-high 11 rebounds to lead Kent State to a 41-38 advantage. The Flashes did give up 12 offensive rebounds, something Starkey said had to be cleaned up in the second half of the season. But BG scored only two second-chance points.
• Reserve forward Monique Smith equaled her career high with six rebounds. She also blocked a shot.
• Kent State blocked nine shots overall, its high for the season. Besides Thall’s four, Katie Shumate blocked three. Shumate also had six rebounds and three assists.
• Modkins had four assists, five points and two steals. Dingle and Megan Carter also had two steals.
• Kent State outscored BG 15-4 on fast-break points.
• Attendance was announced at 1,961, highest of the MAC season and third highest of the season.

The Flashes play three of their next four games on the road, starting Saturday afternoon at second-place Ohio.

Video highlights

.@KentStWBB shut down the Falcons in the second half to win their fifth game in the MAC. 2.5.2020#unleash #gftv pic.twitter.com/nPhX6HbRED

— Kent State Athletics (@KentStAthletics) February 6, 2020

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2,000-POINT RECRUIT: Casey Santoro hits milestone in front KSU’s Todd Starkey, who will coach her next fall.

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Other MAC scores

• Miami (4-6, 11-11) 92, Toledo (5-4, 10-10) 83 at Miami.
• Central Michigan (10-0, 17-4) 66, Northern Illinois (2-7, 6-14) 60 at Central.
• Ohio (7-3, 14-7) 75, Eastern Michigan (5-5, 10-11) 65 at Eastern.
• Western Michigan, Ball State, Buffalo and Akron had midweek byes.

MAC standings.

Kent State’s Katie Shumate defends against Toledo’s Arianne Wheeler. Shumate was wearing No. 21 instead of her usual No. 14. Wheeler led Toledo with a season-high 12 rebounds. (Photo from Toledo Twitter feed.)

Kent State’s women were ahead as the second half began in Toledo Saturday, but somehow it didn’t seem that way.

The Flashes came out sluggish and never found any offense in the second half. They fell to the Rockets 69-60 and dropped to 4-4 in the MAC, 11-8 overall.

“We played like we were down when we were up by three,” senior guard Megan Carter said. “We just came out flat and disconnected, and they took advantage.”

The Flashes were outscored 22-11 in the third quarter and made only 10 of 31 shots in the second half.

The win moves Toledo past Kent State into fourth place in the league at 5-3, 10-9 overall. The Flashes are tied for sixth.

“They obviously came out of the locker room at halftime with more fight and toughness than us,” coach Todd Starkey said. “I thought we were in a good spot mentally coming out second half. We took our foot off the gas just a little bit and that’s all Toledo needed to feel like they were going to win the game.”

The slowdown really started two minutes before halftime. The Flashes had pushed their lead to 31-24 on a 3-point basket by Mariah Modkins.

But Toledo hit two foul shots with 40 seconds to go, and Rocket guard Mariella Santucci scored on a fast break at the buzzer.

Toledo took the lead at the start of the second half, but it was still a one-point game with four minutes to go in the third quarter. But over those last four minutes, Toledo made six foul shots and hit another shot at the buzzer, this one a 3-point basket.

Nakiah Black hits the three at the buzzer to extend the Rockets’ lead to 50-42 over Kent State heading into the fourth quarter.#GoRockets🚀 pic.twitter.com/4gqr3hxrIm

— Toledo Women’s Basketball (@ToledoWBB) February 1, 2020

That made the score 50-42, and Kent never challenged after that.

“Mentally tough teams overcome that type of thing and are able to fight back,” Starkey said. “I don’t think we handled that one at the end of the third quarter the way we should have. We looked down coming over to the bench.”

Foul shots were another big reason for the loss.

Toledo outscored Kent State 26-6 at the foul line, the biggest margin in Starkey’s four years at Kent State. The next biggest was 15, the next one below that 10. The Flashes have made more free throws than their opponents in 80 of 120 games Starkey has coached.

“It’s something we work on,“he said, carefully not criticizing the officiating. “It’s a discipline thing.”

All those foul shots also allowed Toledo time to set up a loose press through the second half. It didn’t force turnovers, but it delayed the Flashes as they moved the ball up the court.

“They were able to set up and slow us down,” Starkey said. “They really controlled the tempo of the game that way. It took us out of our rhythm.”

Box score

The lineup shuffle

Sophomore point guard Asiah Dingle missed her second straight game. In this pregame radio interview with David Wilson on Golden Flash iHeart Radio, Starkey called it “short-term suspension” and said he expected her back Monday. In his postgame interview, he sounded a little less certain about the date of her return. Dingle is KSU’s second-leading scorer.

Modkins started in Dingle’s place, hit two 3-pointer baskets and scored eight points in 34 minutes.

END 1Q | Kent State 17, Toledo 17

Megan Carter has 7 points off the bench, including shot clock-beating jumpers on consecutive possessions late in the quarter. pic.twitter.com/anoAO7MCVT

— Kent State Women’s Basketball (@KentStWBB) February 1, 2020

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

Carter came off the bench in her third game back from mononucleosis. She played 34 minutes and scored 12 points,

Freshman Katie Shumate didn’t start for only the second time this season. Some kind of mixup with her jersey had her wearing No. 21 instead of her usual No. 14. She didn’t play the first four minutes and only scored two points in the first half. She finished with 13 and three 3-pointers.

“Katie’s a player who has to be aggressive from start to finish, and she was a little passive early,” Starkey said.

Hannah Young made the second start of her career but didn’t score in 15 minutes. Clare Kelly also started; she had two points in five minutes.

Notes

• Kent State had 16-4 advantage in points off turnovers, but it was only 4-2 in the second half. The Flashes had only seven turnovers for the game, a season low. Toledo had 17.
• Nila Blackford led Kent State with 14 points and nine rebounds. She played just 25 minutes because of foul trouble.
• Lindsey Thall had nine points on four inside baskets, the most from close range I can remember. She didn’t have a 3-point basket for only the second time of the season and the sixth time of her 66-game career.
• Toledo outrebounded Kent State 42-24, but because the Rocketrs were spending most of the afternoon shooting foul shots, KSU didn’t have a chance for many rebounds. Toledo made only 19 baskets; Kent State had 24.
• Nakiah Black led Toledo with 22 points. Mariella Santucci had 20 .

Kent State returns to the M.A.C. Center on Wednesday to play last-place Bowling Green.

The view from Toledo

Coach Tricia Cullop, quoted in the Toledo Blade:

“In games past we’ve had good minutes, and then we labored in the fourth quarter. I thought today we stayed really focused.”

“We made our free throws and executed offensively better than we have been doing,  and we got stops – all those little things you need to do to win. I’m really proud of this group, and (Kent State) is a really good team.”

“This is kind of that divisive time in the league where there is kind of a logjam in the middle. Any separation we can get will help when we get the pairings later on. You have to try to take care of your home court. That’s why that last one (a Wednesday home loss to Eastern Michigan) stung so bad, and that’s also why this one felt so good.”

Other MAC scores

Central Michigan finished a sweep of the first-half of the MAC schedule with its second-straight overtime victory. The Chippewas beat second-place Ohio 92-90 in Mt. Pleasant.

CMU is 9-0 in the MAC, 16-4 overall. Central has beaten Ohio twice — by a total of three points. On Wednesday Central won in overtime at Buffalo 98-93. Ohio is 6-3 in the MAC, tied for second overall and first in the East Division. Overall the Bobcats are 13-7.

• Northern Illinois (2-6 MAC, 6-12) 64, Buffalo (4-5, 13-7) 63 at NIU.
• Akron (3-6, 109-10) 88, Eastern Michigan (5-4, 10-10) 81 in overtime at Akron.
• Ball State (6-3, 14-7) 68, Western Michigan (4-4, 11-8) 65 at Ball State.
• Miami (2-6, 9-11) 80, Bowling Green (1-7, 8-12) 59 at BG.

MAC standings.

 

Coach Todd Starkey on the sidelines of Saturday’s game with Buffalo. (Photo by David Dermer from KSU Twitter feed.)

There was absolutely nothing good about Kent State’s fourth quarter in its 57-44 loss to Buffalo Saturday.

The Flashes led 33-30 in a gritty defensive game going into the last 10 minutes. Then Kent State:

• Made just two of 15 shots and zero of six 3-point attempts..
• Saw four of its shots blocked by the Bulls.
• Missed six foul shots.
• Turned the ball over six times, four on Buffalo steals. That led to six Buffalo points.

Buffalo:

• Took its first lead since the first quarter with 6:08 to go.
• Then outscored KSU 14-5 over the next two minutes and just increased the score until the end of the game.
• Made 10 of 19 shots after shooting just 27.9% in the first three quarters.
• Committed just one turnover, which the Flashes turned into one point.

What went wrong?

“We showed a complete lack of toughness, especially in the third and fourth quarters,” coach Todd Starkey told reporters after the game. “Some of the rest of it came down to a lack of focus and offensive execution.

“I thought we played a little bit selfish on some of the offensive side. And when we had opportunities to finish (shots close to the basket), we didn’t go up strong. We had too many turnovers down the stretch.”

Starkey was subdued when he talked to reporters, but he was angry during his postgame radio interview with Dan Griffin on Golden Flash iHeart Radio.

“We let (Buffalo) do what they wanted,” he said. “We lay down in the seconds half. I’m disappointed in the team and myself. The game had nothing to do with Buffalo. It was our lack of composure and lack of toughness.”

For three quarters, Kent State played as good defense as it has this season. The Flashes — mostly guards Asiah Dingle and Mariah Modkins — held Buffalo’s star freshman guard, Dyaisha Fair, to four points and forced her into four turnovers. (Fair averages 22 points a game, second highest in the MAC.) KSU had seven steals. The Bulls made just 10 of 39 shots and two of 10 three-pointers.

But Fair scored 13 points in the fourth quarter and had four assists.

Kent’s Megan Carter returned to action after missing three games with mononucleosis  and playing sick for several games before that. She hit two 3-point baskets at the beginning of the second quarter to give the Flashes a lead they held for the next two quarters. She finished with seven points, six rebounds, two assists and two steals in 26 minutes.

Carter is one of five Kent State players to average in double figures.

No one scored 10 points Saturday. Nila Blackford and Dingle led the team with eight. Carter and Lindsey Thall had seven. Freshman guard Katie Shumate didn’t score.

Box score

Notes

8:40 4Q | Kent State 35, UB 33

Asiah Dingle goes up and gets the basket and draws the foul! pic.twitter.com/nvlRq5uMWb

— Kent State Women’s Basketball (@KentStWBB) January 25, 2020

 

• Kent State drops to 3-3 in the MAC and 10-7 on the season. The loss breaks a three-game winning streak and is the second conference loss at home this season.
• Buffalo is 4-3 and 13-6 overall. The Bulls are tied for third in the MAC. Kent State is eighth but only 1 1/2 games away from a tie for second.
• Buffalo leads the conference in rebounding, but the Flashes had the edge Saturday, 41-40, and in offensive rebounding, 16-14. But KSU got only three  second-chance points from those rebounds. Buffalo had nine. Blackford and Thall led Kent State with seven.
• 44 points was the fewest Kent State has scored this season. Buffalo’s 57 was the second fewest the Flashes have allowed against Division I competition and the Bulls’ second lowest of the season.
• Kent was outscored in the paint 28-12 and made just 24.1% of its shots.
• Blackford had been fourth in shooting in the MAC games going into the game. She was three of 16 Saturday. Thall had been fifth in the MAC in 3-point shooting. She was one of eight and two of 16 overall.
• Kent State had led the MAC in foul shooting and blocked shows. The Flashes made 10 of 19 free throws, their lowest percentage of the season. Thall blocked two shots, but Buffalo blocked eight, led by forward Marissa Hamilton’s four.
• The victory was Buffalo coach Felisha Legette-Jack’s 156th at the school. That’s the most of any Buffalo women’s coach.
• Attendance was 1,011.

The Flashes are home again at 7 p.m. Wednesday against Ball State. The Cardinals beat KSU 66-62 in the conference opener and are 5-2 in the MAC and 12-6 overall.

Other MAC scores

• Central Michigan (7-0 MAC, 14-4 overall) 73, Toledo (4-2, 9-8) 66 at Central.
• Ohio (5-2, 12-6) 79, Bowling Green (1-6, 8-11) 69 at Ohio.
• Ball State (5-2, 13-6) 80, Miami (1-6, 8-11) 63 at Ball State.
• Eastern Michigan (4-3, 9-9) 62, Northern Illinois (1-6, 5-13) 55 at Eastern.
• Western Michigan (4-3, 11-7) 79, Akron (2-5, 9-9) 71 at Western.

MAC standings.

Lots more video is on the KSU Twitter feed. 

In conference play, Katie Shumate is averaging 13.8 points and 7.0 rebounds. She’s shooting 46% from the floor and 50% from 3-point distance. (File photo from KSU website.)

The Flashes had their midweek bye this week, but coach Todd Starkey and the team have been busy.

Starkey spent much of the week in Texas, where he’s recruiting two topflight guards. The NCAA doesn’t allow coaches to talk about players they’re recruiting, but both have tweeted their offers from KSU. One is a 6-1 wing, the other a 5-10 guard who can play the point or shooting guard.

Both graduate in 2021. Starkey has said that will be an important recruiting class because the players and the next year’s class will be taking over after the team’s six-person sophomore class graduates. That class has provided starters Asiah Dingle and Lindsey Thall and top reserves Mariah Modkins and Hannah Young. Indiana transfer Linsey Marchese joins them as juniors next season, and she’s likely to play major minutes.

Starkey took time Thursday for a wide-ranging interview before his team practiced Thursday night for their Saturday game with Buffalo at 1 p.m. at the M.A.C. Center.

On Buffalo, which is 12-5 and 3-3 in the MAC:

“They’ve got the second-leading scorer in the MAC and leading freshman scorer in the country in Dyaisha Fair. She’s a problem. She has the ability to more than just score. She’s one of the leaders in the conference in assists and a very good rebounding for a guard.”

Fair is averaging 22.4 points, 4.3 assists and 5.6 rebounds a game. She ranks 16th in the MAC in shooting percentage (36.5), 12th in free-throw shooting (71.6%), eighth in 3-point percentage (34.4) and second in 3-point baskets per game (3.3).

“Therese Onwuka (a 5-10 guard averaging 15.5 points and 7.3 rebounds) is a heckuva a player and a senior. She’s been in NCAA tournaments and has experience in big games. Hannah Hall (5-3 senior point guard) has knocked down big-time shots in the league and post-season.

“Buffalo is a very dangerous team. They have that championship mentality.”

The Bulls have gone to the NCAA tournament the last two years, reaching the Sweet 16 in 2018.

On the Bulls’ 69-66 loss at Ball State Wednesday:

“Ball State is a very tactical team and the best defensive team in the league. They have the ability that can take things away from you. They certainly did something against us as well.”

(The Flashes lost at Ball State in their conference opener by a very similar score, 66-62.)

“Just because Ball State is able to do certain things to Buffalo doesn’t mean we can. We don’t have the same personnel. We have to come up with a game plan based on what we feel we can do well.”

Ball State limited Fair to her worst game of the season — 11 points, 4 of 18 shooting, 1 of 11 from 3-point distance.

On the state of his team after winning three in a row, including two on the road:

“We’re starting to get better shots, and we’re starting to share the ball a little bit better. We still have really good individual players. In conference play, Nila Blackford is up to almost 50% from the floor. Katie Shumate is making 47% from the floor and 50% from the 3-point line.

On assists, which has been a weak area statistically:

“If you’ve got players who can create for themselves, your assist total might be a little lower because they don’t need somebody else to get them to that point. It’s more about field goal percentage and where we’re getting our shots from and things like rebounding margin — all those different things that go into winning and losing games.”

On the team seeing big leads dwindle in the late minutes on the road:

“Obviously we have to be able to have them handle pressure a little bit better. Some of that just comes for being in it and learning each other and getting better. We still have a lot of room for growth.

“And if you’re young and you’re finding ways to win tough games on the road, I that’s a good sign.”

On how the team has missed Megan Carter and Ali Poole:

(Carter has missed three games with mononucleosis. Poole suffered a partial ACL tear in summer practice, played with a brace for 13 games, then blew the entire ACL diving for a ball against Western Michigan. Her playing career is over.)

“We lost two senior starters. If Ali’s 100% healthy, she’s playing in those games down the stretch because of her experience and her composure and her voice and knowing where to be. And that changes things significantly.

“And not having Megan — your fifth-year senior ball handler —  on the court coming down the stretch where teams are pressing….those are significant things.

“We’re starting three freshman and two sophomores in one of the toughest leagues in the country. It’s not always going to look pretty, but I’m pleased with the progress that we’ve made.”

On when Carter will be back:

“Hopefully soon.”

Against Buffalo?

“That’s going to have a lot to do with how practice looks the next couple of days. But I certainly am not getting that information out before we play Buffalo. I don’t want them to be able to game plan for her.”

On Mariah Modkins, Hannah Young and Monique Smith:

All have seen playing time increase significantly in recent games, even before Carter left the lineup.

“They’ve been getting better results in practice and playing better when they get minutes in games. So that directly leads to more minutes. And we’re trying to find some balance and bench scoring and getting some players rest.”

On what the team did in the bye week:

“With this young team, mental, medical and physical rest is really important. They did some individual workout stuff with assistant coaches. Assistants had full practice was yesterday and the day before. The nice thing about having continuity on your staff is they know what you want. In a typical week we play on Wednesdays, so they did a lot more up and down yesterday.

“And they’ve already been at work on Buffalo a little bit.”

On the team going forward:

“The biggest thing between us and being in the top four in the league on the stretch is just consistency. That just comes from learning. I’m hopeful that we’ll continue to get better.”