Corynne Hauser is coming into her own as a scorer for the Kent State women’s basketball team.

She led four Flashes in double figures with 17 points Wednesday as KSU beat Eastern Michigan 79-66. Hauser, a freshman guard from Rochester, Pennsylvania, had scored 18 points against Toledo Saturday and 23 against Miami last Wednesday. She’s moved into third place on the team with a scoring average of 9.9 points per game. Lindsey Thall leads the Flashes at 10.9.

The victory gives Kent State a 3-2 record in the Mid-American Conference and an 11-5 record overall. The Flashes are tied with Toledo, Buffalo and Western Michigan for fourth place in the conference. Bowling Green, Akron and Ball State are tied for first at 4-1.

Hauser scored seven of Kent State’s first nine points as the Flashes built a 24-13 first-quarter lead.

“I was just coming out trying to be aggressive,” Hauser said. “We wanted to play quick — the way we have been in the past few games. So I was pretty much just taking what the defense gave me. They were sagging off a little bit, and I was able to get open.”

“Corynne got us off into a great rhythm offensively,” Starkey said. “They had to make some adjustments and really pay more attention to her, which really led to our balance in scoring.” 

Hauser had six assists and leads the team with 3.1 per game.

“When when you have a play maker like Corynne, it opens other people up,” Starkey said. ” One of the things that makes her so dangerous is you can’t help too much off her because she’s able to find other players. Corynne could have probably gone for 25 points tonight. But then we don’t have the balanced scoring that we had.”

Senior Clare Kelly had 14 points off the bench for the Flashes. Senior Katie Shumate had 11 and graduate student Hannah Young had 10. Junior Casey Santoro and sophomore Bridget Dunn each had nine, and grad student Lindsey Thall scored seven.

Kent State’s 79 points were the most the Flashes have scored against a Division I team this season. Its 51.9% shooting percentage and its 45.8% 3-point shooting were also their best against a D1 opponent. Kent State made 71% of its shots in the first quarter. For the first three quarters, KSU made 59% of its 3-pointers.

Eastern Michigan came into the game leading the MAC in rebounding, but the Flashes outrebounded the Eagles 29-28 and held them to three second-chance points. Santoro, the smallest player on the floor at 5-4, led KSU in rebounding with five. Hauser, Shumate, Young and Dunn all had four. Only Dunn is a post player.

“We have a term with our guards on rebounding: ‘They have to join the party.’ They can’t leave it up to the post players to do all the work. We talked about how we had to gang rebound — get all five involved. To outrebound that team was a tall task, and we were able to do that.”

Box score

Wednesday MAC scores

MAC standings

NEXT FOR KENT STATE: At Bowling Green (4-1 MAC, 15-2 overall) at 1 p.m. Saturday on ESPN3.

In order to get to bed at a decent hour, I’m going to stop here and write a follow-up story tomorrow.

Going into Saturday, Kent State was ranked 13th in the College Insider Mid-Major Top 25. Toledo was ranked ninth.

Two minutes into the third period, the teams were tied at 38-38.

But that was the end of a close game.

Toledo outscored Kent State 22-6 for the rest of the quarter, and while the Flashes closed the gap somewhat in the fourth period, the Rockets came away with a 77-68 victory.

With the win, Toledo is in a five-way tie for first place in the Mid-American Conference at 3-1. Kent State is 2-2 and is in a three-way tie for sixth. Overall, the Flashes are 10-5 and have lost two games in a row. Toledo overall is 12-3.

Three factors made the difference Saturday:

• Toledo senior guard Quinesha Lockett, a first-team all-MAC player last season, played like a conference MVP. She made 13-of-17 shots, 4-of-7 three-pointers and 6-of-6 foul shots for 36 points — the most any MAC player has scored this season. Thirteen of those points came during the third-quarter run that put the game out of reach.
• Kent State’s tallest players — 6-2 senior Lindsey Thall and 6-3 Bridget Dunn — were in foul trouble most of the game and were never a factor.
• Toledo put the ball in the basket far better than Kent State did. The Rockets made 50.9% of their shots — 13 points better than Kent’s average opponent has done this season — and 50% of their 3-pointers —18 points better than KSU has allowed.

“I’ve seen a lot of film of Locket and played against her in person over the last few years,” coach Todd Starkey said. “I haven’t seen her play to that level. She was just kind of in the zone and, and we had nothing to be able to say about it.”

KSU freshman Corynne Hauser was one of the players who tried to stop Lockett.

“She a tough player,” Hauser said. “I don’t think she had really too many easy looks. She knocked down tough, contested shots.”

Toledo coach Tricia Cullop said the Rockets “really needed” Lockett in this game.

“We all know what she’s capable of doing,” Cullop said. “She could probably do that more often, but she’s got a balanced team around her. But tonight it was great to see her be so aggressive, not only driving to the basket but from the three-point line and in transition. She did a marvelous job.”

Thall picked up her second foul with 15 seconds to go in the first quarter, then Dunn was called for her second foul two minutes into the second period.

Reserves Jenna Batsch and Annie Pavlansky, who usually don’t play more than 10 minutes a game, each hit a 3-point shot and a 2-point basket to earn the Flashes a 32-32 tie at halftime.

But the fouls took a toll.

“It changed our game plan 100%,” Starkey said. “When you don’t have your two best post players available, it changes the way we play offense. It changes some of the things we do defensively.”

Thall and Dunn scored a combined two points and got a combined two rebounds in the first half. Thall picked up her third four two minutes into the second half; Dunn got her third three minutes later.

In the second half, Toledo started its tallest and bulkiest player — 6-2 sophomore Jessica Cook. The Rockets went to her for three baskets, two of which led to 3-point play.

“They came out in the third quarter and said, ‘We’re gonna pound it inside and see if we can get them in foul trouble,'” Starkey said. “That was the right game plan when they had our two best post players in trouble.”

Thall finished with 12 points, six in the fourth quarter, and no rebounds in 12 minutes. Dunn didn’t score and had three rebounds in 17 minutes.

Hauser led Kent State with 18 points after setting a career-high of 23 in Wednesday’s loss at Miami. She made 6-of-10 shots.

“I”m being more aggressive,” Hauser said. “I’m finding pretty good looks in our offense coming off screens. But it’s not just about scoring. If my look’s there, I’ll take it. But if I could get somebody else’s look, too, it goes a long way.”

Hauser has 44 assists on the season, 19 more than anyone else on the roster.

“She’s just playing the way she’s capable of playing,” Starkey said. “We want her to be aggressive like that. I think she passed up a few other shots that she should have taken today, to be honest with you.”

Starkey thought his team played much better than in their 84-76 overtime loss to Miami on Wednesday.

“I think we played with a lot more focus and intensity,” the coach said. “The thing that’s frustrating is that if we play as hard as we did today, we win the game on Wednesday. Then you come into this game, and you’re like, ‘It’s the best team in the league. They’re going to be tough to beat.’ So we could be 3-1 in the league. But now we’re 2-2.”

Running the numbers

• Kent State made 39.3% of its shots. It’s made more than 40% only three times against Division I teams.
• The Flashes made 13-of-16 free throws and have made 45-of-52 over their last three games.
• KSU scored 14 points off of 13 Toledo turnovers. The Rockets scored five off of 12 Kent turnovers.
• Toledo outrebounded the Flashes 35-32.

Box score

Next: Home Wednesday against Eastern Michigan

The Flashes host Eastern Michigan at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the M.A.C. Center. Eastern is 1-3 and lost to Buffalo 78-59 at Buffalo on Saturday.

Other MAC scores

• Bowling Green (3-1 MAC, 14-2 overall) 71, Akron (3-1, 12-3) 66 at Akron. BG outscored the Zips 31-13 in the fourth quarter.
• Ball State (3-1. 13-4) 92, Miami (1-3, 6-11) 61 at Ball State.
• Western Michigan (7-8, 2-2) 71, Central Michigan (1-3, 3-12) 60 at Central.
• Northern Illinois (2-2. 10-5) 78, Ohio (0-4, 2-13) 66 at Northern.

MAC standings

With two minutes to go in the third quarter, Kent State held a 48-38 lead over Miami.

But the last 17 minutes of the game — including overtime — belonged to the Redhawks as Kent State lost its first Mid-American Conference game of the year, 84-76. The Flashes are 2-1 in the MAC and 10-4 overall. Miami is 1-2 and 6-10.

KSU is tied with Toledo, Ball State, Bowling Green, and Buffalo for second place in the league. Akron is the MAC’s only undefeated team at 3-0.

“We played really poorly” during the last 17 minutes, coach Todd Starkey said. “I thought we got out-toughed and outhustled, which was really disappointing.

“We had control of the game two or three different times, and we let them back in the game. You let a team like that — at their place — hang around and hang around, and then all of a sudden you blink, and you’re playing from behind hoping to get into overtime.”

Miami took a 68-66 lead — its first since halfway through the first quarter — with 21 seconds to go. KSU’s Hannah Young tied it with two free throws seven seconds later. Miami advanced the ball to its front court but didn’t get a shot off.

Two of Miami’s top three scorers fouled out late in the game, but the Flashes couldn’t take advantage.

Kent State never led in overtime. The score was 77-74 with 1:33 to go, but the Redhawks made seven free throws in the final minute-and-a-half while Kent State missed five 3-point attempts.

“We had way too many errors on offense in overtime and gave up three or four offensive rebounds,” Starkey said.

Kent State got most of its points from three guards, two of whom aren’t usually big scorers.

Freshman Corynne Hauser had 23 points and five assists, both career highs.

Graduate student Hannah Young had career highs in points (20) and steals (5) and led the Flashes in rebounding with seven. She had been averaging 6.4 points going into the game. Young played her 125th game in a KSU uniform, breaking the record set by current assistant coach Alexa Golden. It’s a record that could last a long time. Because of special COVID rules, Young should finish after five full seasons instead of the four for players during normal times.

Freshman Dionna Gray scored 14 points, another career-high. She played 38 minutes, the most of KSU’s three point guards. Gray had been averaging five points a game.

“The three of them kept us in the game,” Starkey said.

But Kent State’s usually scorers provided little punch. Leading scorer Lindsey Thall was 1-of-9 from the field and 0-of-4 on 3-point attempts and had four rebounds. Second-leading scorer Katie Shumate had one basket and one rebound. Third-leading scorer Casey Santoro didn’t score.

“We needed more productivity from them,” Starkey said.

Running the numbers

• The Flashes made 7-of-10 three-point baskets in the first half on their way to a 36-28 lead. But they were 1-of-10 in the second half and 0-for-5 in overtime on 3s.
• Miami made 46.5 of its shots, including 4-of-5 in overtime. The Redhawks were 8-of-13 on 3-points for 44.4%. Both percentages were much better than Kent’s average opponent. Kent State shot 38.5% from the floor and 40.9% from 3-point distance.
• Kent State made 25-of-28 free throws and after shooting just two foul shots in the first half. Miami made 22-of-30 free throws.
• For the fourth straight game, Kent State was badly outscored in the paint. Miami had 32 points to KSU’s 16. Ohio had outscored KSU in the paint 30-20 on Wednesday, Buffalo 44-28 last Saturday and Coppin State 30-18 on New Year’s Eve.
• Miami outrebounded the Flashes 38-34 and outscored KSU 15-11 on second-chance points.
• Miami forward Sierra Morrow blocked six Kent State shots.

Box score

Next: Home on Saturday against 11-3 Toledo,

Kent State plays the Rockets at 2 p.m. Saturday at the M.A.C. Center. Toledo won the conference with a 19-1 record last season and was the pre-season favorite this year. The Rockets are 2-1 in the MAC, losing 67-66 at Northern Illinois, and are 11-3 overall. Toledo beat Ball State (2-1 MAC, 12-4 overall) 83-76 on Wednesday.

Other MAC scores

• Akron (3-0 MAC, 12-2 overall) 60, Eastern Michigan (1-2, 9-5) 43 at Eastern.
• Bowling Green (2-1, 13-2) 101, Central Michigan (1-2, 3-11) 68 at BG.
• Western Michigan (1-2, 6-8) 79, Northern Illinois (1-2, 9-5) 70 at Western.
• Buffalo (2-1, 7-5) 69, Ohio (0-3, 2-12) 64 at Ohio.

MAC standings

It’s been 17 years since Kent State beat Ohio University as badly as it did on Saturday.

Back then, Kent State was in the midst of the best years in program history. The Flashes finished first or second in the MAC or Eastern Division for 12 straight years. The score then was 93-74 in the first round of the Mid-American Conference Tournament.

On Saturday, the score was 60-44. The victory was:

• The fifth in a row for Kent State.
• The second win in a row to start the MAC season.
• The fewest points KSU had allowed a Division I team this year.

Kent State’s record is 10-3 and 2-0 in the MAC. The Flashes are tied for first place with Ball State and Akron.

Ohio is 2-11 and 0-2 in the league. The Bobcats are off to their worst start since 1975-76, Ohio’s first year of varsity basketball. That year they also started 2-11 and finished 3-12.

Ohio had been in the top echelon of the MAC for the last 10 years before all-MAC guards Cece Hooks and Erica Johnson, along with three-year starter Gabby Burris, graduated last spring. The Bobcats have only one player who started more than six games last season.

Kent State’s defense powered its Saturday victory. Ohio’s 44 points were the fewest it has scored this season.

The Flashes held OU to 29% shooting — lowest by a Division I opponent — and just 1-of-21 on 3-point shots.

“We needed to answer what we thought was a poor defensive effort against Buffalo,” coach Todd Starkey said. “Today, I thought we did a really good job of staying connected to contain dribble penetration but also did a good job of closing on shooters and contesting.

“The girls did a really good job of taking in the scouting report and knowing personnel, so we know who to really contest up on and who we needed to play off of a little bit.

“Probably 30% of the 3s they took were good looks for them. The rest, we did a good job of contesting.”

OU sophomore guard Yaya Felder came into Saturday ranked second in the MAC with a 19.8 point-per-game average. She picked up three first-half fourls and scored six points.

For Kent, only 6-3 sophomore Bridget Dunn scored in double figures with 14, her best total of the season. Dunn also had nine rebounds in just 17 minutes.

“Bridget’s playing very efficient basketball,” Starkey said. “She’s taking advantage of the touches that she’s getting and rebounding the ball really well.”

Though she’s averaging fewer minutes than last season, Dunn’s rebounding is up about a one-and-a-half per game. After leading rebounder Nila Blackford transferred in the off-season, KSU coaches emphasized that Dunn needed to step up.

“She’s really made the adjustment well,” Starkey said.

Senior guard Clare Kelly hit three 3-point shots for the second game in a row and finished with nine points. Her 29 minutes were more than any of KSU’s starters.

“We just have talent in our cup,” Starkey said. “In Bridget and Clare, you’ve got two players coming off the bench who are talented enough to start on a lot of teams.”

Senior Katie Shumate also had nine points and led the Flashes in rebounding with 11.

“She’s really put a great deal of effort into the glass and had a few huge rebounds for us down the stretch,” Starkey said. “I’m really pleased with how hard she’s playing right now and her level of consistency.”

Running the numbers

• Starkey talks about the important of transition offense and defense almost every game. On Saturday, KSU had 20 fast-break points to Ohio’s five.
• The Flashes outrebounded Ohio 43-32.
• Kent made 48% of its shots through the first three quarters but hit only 3-of-16 in the fourth. Its overall shooting percentage was 39.7.
• KSU had 14 assists, led by three from Kelly, Lindsey Thall and Abby Ogle. It was the seventh-straight game the Flashes have had at least 13 assists.

Box score

Next: Wednesday at Miami

KSU travels to Miami for a 7 p.m. game Wednesday. Miami (5-10 and 0-2 in the MAC) lost to Akron (10-2, 2-0) on Saturday.

Other MAC scores

• Northern Illinois (9-4, 1-1 MAC) 67, Toledo (10-3, 1-1) 66 at Northern. NIU came from 17 points behind in the fourth quarter.
• Bowling Green (12-2, 1-1) 79, Eastern Michigan (9-4, 1-1) 63 at BG.
• Ball State ((12-3, 2-0) 76, Western Michigan (5-8, 0-2) 70 at Western.
• Buffalo (6-5, 1-1) 70, Central Michigan (3-10, 1-1) 63 at Buffalo.

Kent State made only 1-of-11 shots in the fourth quarter as it saw a seven-point lead slip away.

But the Flashes didn’t miss from the field in overtime as they beat Coppin State 72-69 in their last game before Mid-American Conference play starts on Wednesday.

Graduate student Lindsey Thall hit a 3-point shot with 40 seconds to go in overtime to give Kent State the lead. Casey Santoro, who had an assist on Thall’s basket, hit a free throw 26 seconds later for the final margin.

Lindsey Thall’s go-ahead 3-pointer in the final minute of overtime is today’s @IBEW 306 Electrifying Play of the Game, courtesy of #GFTV.#GoFlashes⚡️ pic.twitter.com/DCZ5yZxY6g

— Kent State Athletics (@KentStAthletics) December 31, 2022

Kent State finishes its non-conference season at 8-3, the same record as MAC opponents Eastern Michigan and Northern Illinois. Bowling Green had the league’s best record at 11-1. Akron and Toledo were 9-2 and Ball State was 10-3. Kent State’s non-conference schedule was by far the toughest in the league, ranking 36th in Division I by WarrenNolan.com, an analytics site.

The Flashes open conference play against Buffalo (5-4) at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the M.A.C. Center.

“That was a really good test for us going into conference play — though a little tighter than I wanted,” coach Todd Starkey said. “We shot the ball horribly in the fourth quarter. Nine percent is not going to do it, so we have to get that fixed and not get stagnant offensively. But I’m really proud of our resilience.”

Kent State got contributions from many players.

“Lindsey’s game winner was a huge shot, obviously,” Starkey said, “but we had hustle plays by other people. Clare Kelly had a dive to save the ball going out of bounds. That gets us another possession. Abby Ogle makes a mistake at one end. Then she sprints 94 feet, contests a shot at the other end, and they don’t score. It’s those little things that really helped us win this game.”

Five Flashes scored in double figures. Thall had 15, made four 3-pointers and blocked two shots. Corynne Hauser had 12 on 6-of-9 shooting and had five assists.. Santoro, Kelly and Katie Shumate all had 11 points. Shumate had a double-double with 10 rebounds.

Ogle had five points and six rebounds while Bridget Dunn’s one basket — a 3-pointer — gave Kent State the lead at the beginning of overtime.

The game had 14 lead changes and was tied eight times.

KSU’s Hannah Young, who had started every game this season and last, missed Saturday’s game with an illness. She is the Flashes’ leading rebounder.

Coppin State is 3-12 and was playing its 11th-straight road game. The overtime loss was its second in a row; the Eagles lost in overtime at Akron 85-76 on Thursday.

Box score

MAC non-conference standings

The score was overwhelming.

So was the noise.

As 2,000 Kent elementary school students screamed for almost two hours, the Kent State women’s basketball team routed Otterbein 97-36 in a Tuesday morning “Education Day” game. It was the Flashes’ second-straight overwhelming victory against a Division III team, which doesn’t give athletic scholarships. Ten days ago, KSU beat Hiram 105-33. The point difference against Hiram was the largest margin of victory in Kent State history. Tuesday’s margin tied for the third largest.

Kent State scheduled Otterbein and Hiram to balance its first six games against Division I opponents. That schedule, which included a win and two losses against Power Five teams, was ranked 12th in the country.

KSU’s record is now 7-3. Otterbein is 5-4. The game was technically an exhibition for Otterbein; Division III schools are limited to 25 regular-season games.

The story of the game was more about the crowd than about the score. Teachers who accompanied their students could barely hear themselves think. The players sometimes couldn’t hear each other on the court.

And they all had a grand time.

“My ears are still ringing,” graduate student Lindsey Thall said with a smile during the team’s postgame press conference. “It’s really fun. They bring a lot of energy for the game, so it kind of hypes us up.”

Fellow grad student Abby Ogle joined her teammates in signing autographs for the students after the game.

“You feel like a little celebrity,” she said.

The Education Day game is one of the highlights of the KSU season, coach Todd Starkey said.

“It’s so much fun for our players,” he said, “and so much fun for the kids in the community to see and be connected to Kent State.”

Otterbein scored first and led 5-2 two-and-a-half minutes into the game.

But that was it.

The Flashes reeled off 30 straight points over the next 13 minutes.

Every Kent State player scored at least two points and grabbed at least one rebound. All played at least seven minutes; 13 played at least 10 minutes. No starter played more than 18.

It gave the core of the roster a lot of time to support their teammates.

“I like to cheer for everybody,” Thall said. “I love hyping everybody up when they’re making shots. It’s still fun on the bench.”

Starkey said it’s wonderful to see.

“The number one responsibility of any of our players is to be a good teammate,” he said. “it’s neat to see them all support each other. And it’s genuine. They really care about each other, enjoy cheering for each other.”

Though the team scored 97 points, no individual scored more than 13. Freshman Corynne Hauser led the Flashes with that number. Thall, freshman Dionna Gray and Ogle all had 12, and senior Katie Shumate had 10. Junior Casey Santoro and sophomore Jenna Batsch each scored eight.

Grad student Hannah Young had seven rebounds, leading the team for the fourth time this season. Hauser and senior Clare Kelly each had three assists, and Shumate and Gray each had three steals.

The team headed home for Christmas after the game, will return on Dec. 26 and resume practice on Dec. 27. The Flashes will play Coppin State (3-9) in their final non-conference game at 1 p.m. Dec. 31 at the M.A.C. Center.

Running the numbers

• Kent State’s 45.8% shooting on 3-pointers was its highest of the season. So was the Flashes’ 50 rebounds and 24-rebound margin. Its 52.2 overall field-goal percentage was ./6 points behind its season-best against Hiram.
• KSU’s 13 steals and 16 assists were second highest of the season, again behind the Hiram game.
• The Flashes outscored Otterbein 22-8 off turnovers, 50-18 in the paint, 14-4 on second-chance points and 21-7 on fast breaks.
• Ogle’s 6-of-7 field goals, Hauser’s 5-of-7 and Gray’s 5-of-7 were the best of their careers.
• Six different players blocked a shot, eight had an assist and seven had a steal.

Family Christmases

Ogle, Thall and Starkey all said they were most looking forward to seeing family.

Starkey’s four adult children will be visiting him here. Thall has a short trip home to Strongsville.

Ogle has the longest trip of any player on the roster — 800-plus miles to Baldwin City, Kansas.

The temperature there was 11 degrees below zero on Tuesday morning, Ogle said.

Box score

The score says it all:

Kent State 105, Hiram 33.

It was the largest margin of victory in Kent State basketball history — men’s or women’s.

It was the most points the KSU women have scored since 2000, when they beat Bowling Green 106-94.

It was overwhelming from start to finish.

Kent State led 14-0, then 22-1, then 31-4 at the end of the first quarter. The score was 55-13 at halftime, then 79-22 after three quarters.

A free throw by graduate student Annie Pavlansky made the game 100-31 with 1:36 to go, and Pavlansky ended things with a 3-point basket with 24 seconds left.

Yes, it was Hiram, a Division III school that doesn’t give athletic scholarships. The game was technically an “exhibition” for the Terriers because Division III schoocan only to play 25 regular-season games. (In its seven regular-season games so far, Hiram is 4-3.)

Counting the Hiram game, Kent State is 6-3.

Why does KSU even play Hiram? “Schedule balance,” coach Todd Starkey said in a pre-season interview. The game was a break for the Flashes, who had played the 12th most difficult schedule in the country for its first eight games, according to Warren Nolan.com, a statistics site I follow.

Thirteen Kent State players got in the game (grad student Lindsey Thall sat out with an ankle injury), and all scored. Twelve played more than 12 minutes. Only one starter played more than 17 minut; thatat was sophomore forward Bridget Dunn. With Thall out, Dunn started her first game of the season.

“It was nice to get everybody some playing time,” Starkey said. “Everybody came in and contributed with great energy.

“Every single one of these players works really hard in the classroom and in practice every day.”

In the interview room after the game were a couple of players who haven’t been in the headlines this season.

“It was really fun,” said freshman point guard Dionna Gray, who scored 10 points and had four assists and two steals. “Everybody got to touch the ball, and everybody got to score.”

Gray averaged 22 points a game and was Gatorade player of the year in West Virginia last season. At Kent State, she’s competing for playing time at point guard with two other all-staters — junior Casey Santoro and fellow freshman Corynne Hauser. Before Gray played 19 minutes on Sunday, she had averaged seven minutes a game.

“It’s been a while, so it felt good to be able to feel more like a point guard today,” she said.

Grad student Abby Ogle, who has played 10 minutes a game as part of KSU’s main rotation, scored a career-high 13 points in 13 minutes. She had five steals, the most by any Kent State player this season, and three assists.

Ogle was a third-team junior college all-American but played sparingly at West Virginia, her first four-year school. After she transferred to Kent State, Ogle was injured early last season and played in only six games.

“It’s just really nice to get back to how I used to play before everything happened,” she said. Ogle is tied with Katie Shumate for the team lead in steals with 10, and she has played 40% of Shumate’s minutes. Her philosophy on steals:

“Gamble, but gamble well,” she said.

Other players who got far more minutes than usual:

Freshman wing Tatiana Thomaho led the team in rebounds with eight. She scored five points, had three assists, two steals and a blocked shot in 13 minutes.

“She’s a great athlete, a phenomenal finisher and rebounder,” Starkey said. “Like all the freshmen, she’s still on a learning curve. There’s a process you have to go through to understand how intense college basketball is, and they’re still learning that.”

Redshirt freshman Elena Maier, who had missed more than two years of basketball after a knee injury in high school, scored her first collegiate points and played 15 minutes.

“Go g through an ACL your senior year in high school is tough,” Starkey said. “Then she came here and had to have another surgery to repair some of that stuff. That was a long two years for her.”

Her points came on a 3-point shot for the corner, a spot where she shoots “as well as anybody on our team,” Starkey said.

The team chose Maier to ring the Victory Bell after the game.

Sophomore guard Lexi Linton stole the ball and went the length of the court for layups three times. The game was her second of the season, the steals were the first of her career, and her six points doubled her previous college output. “She can be a disrupter out there,” Starkey said.

The regulars

• Senior Katie Shumate, the Flashes’ leading scorer, led the team with 18 points in just 13 minutes. She was 7-of-9 shooting.
• Sophomore Bridget Dunn scored seven points, had five rebounds, two assists and two steals and blocked a shot.
• Freshman Corynne Hauser had four assists. She leads the team with 2.9 assists per game.
• Grad student Hannah Young, the team’s leading rebounder, had six in 12 minutes, blocked two shots and had three steals.
• Grad student Annie Pavlansky had 13 points on 5-of-9 shooting and five rebounds, both the best of her five-year career.
• Sophomore Jenna Batsch had nine points, her most of the season, on 4-of-8 shooting.

Running the numbers

Across the board, they were KSU’s best of the season.

• The Flashes had 25 steals, their most in at least 12 years
• They had 22 assists, one below their highest number since 2012-13.
• KSU’s 51.8% shooting was its best of the season.
• Hiram’s 18.4% shooting was the worst of any Kent opponent.
• Kent State outscored Hiram 52-4 off turnovers, 54-6 in the paint, 22-5 on second-chance points and 33-0 on fast breaks. Its bench outscored Hiram’s reserves 66-9/

Box score

Next: Exams, then Otterbein

The Flashes are off until Dec. 20 for final exams. Then they will play an 11 a.m. “Education Day” game against Otterbein in the M.A.C. Center in front of several thousand elementary school children. Like Hiram, Otterbein is a Division III school and is 4-3 on the season.

Around the MAC

Some big wins for Mid-American Conference Schools in the last week:

• Ball State (8-2) upset Pittsburgh (6-4) of the ACC 68-66 in overtime Sunday.
• Toledo (7-2) beat No. 14 Michigan (9-1) on Thursday in Ann Arbor 71-68.

Kent State is the only other MAC school to beat a Power Five team —58-55 at Oklahoma State (now 8-2) on Nov. 20.

MAC standings (just non-conference games so far)

Throughout Kent State’s 5-2 start to the season, its defense has carried the team.

On Wednesday, the defense couldn’t hold up.

Duquesne made 48.1% of its shots and 56.3% of its 3-point attempts on its way to a 73-67 victory over the Flashes in Pittsburgh. Both were the highest numbers put up by a Kent State opponent this season.

Kent State is now 5-3; Duquesne is 7-2.

The win broke KSU’s four-game winning streak.

“Our defense was subpar, for sure,” coach Todd Starkey said. “I thought Duquesne did a good job of executing their stuff, and we did a good job of letting them do it. Some of it was a collective lack of effort, but we just weren’t as connected physically and verbally as we’ve been recently.”

Kent State’s offense shot as well as it has all season in the first half but couldn’t keep it up the rest of the game.

In the first 20 minutes, the Flashes made 10-of-19 three-pointers (52.6%) and 16-of-31 total field goal attempts (51.6%). Both were well above KSU’s season numbers.

But in the second half, KSU made only eight baskets (23.5%) and four 3-pointers. In the fourth quarter, KSU made 3-of-15 shots and scored just nine points.

“We gave up way too many first-quarter points (21) and kind of were playing out of a hole,” Starkey said. “We shot well, and that’s what kept us in the game.

“We had opportunities in the second half but really struggled to score. Our execution offensively down the stretch wasn’t what it needed to be. They just outplayed us for a good portion of the game.”

A 26-18 second quarter put Kent State up by five at halftime, but Duquesne tied it halfway through the third quarter. The Dukes went ahead by as many as four, but Bridget Dunn tied the game with a 3-pointer with 12 seconds to go in the third quarter.

Duquesne scored the first six points of the fourth quarter and led the rest of the game. In the fourth quarter, Kent State twice went four minutes without scoring.

Hannah Young made her first four 3-point attempts but was shut out for the rest of the game. Duquesne point guard Tess Myers made her first 3-pointers and finished 6-of-8 from beyond the arc.

“They made the adjustment on our hot shooter,” Starkey said. “We did not make the adjustment on theirs.”

Down the lineup

• Carey Santoro led Kent State with 13 points and had seven assists, the most by a Kent State player this season. At 5-4, Santoro blocked a shot by Duquesne’s 6-4 Precious Johnson.
• Young had 12 points and three rebounds.
• Katie Shumate led the Flashes with 10 rebounds and scored eight points.
• Freshman Corynne Hauser started her first game and had seven points, five rebounds, four assists and a steal. She had a large group of fans from her hometown of Rochester, Pennsylvania, which is about 30 miles from Pittsburgh.
• Lindsay Thall, KSU’s leading scorer, made 2-of-13 shots and didn’t have a rebound for the first time this season. She blocked two shots.
• Bridget Dunn, Kent State’s 6-3 sophomore forward, had a season-high nine points and seven rebounds.
• Abby Ogle went 3-for-4 from the field and had two rebounds.

Kent State’s bench outscored Duquesne’s 20-0.

More numbers

• Kent State’s 14 three-point baskets are the fourth most in a game in school history.
• The last five games between Kent State and Duquesne have been decided by fewer than seven points. KSU had won three in a row before Wednesday.
• The Flashes scored 16 points off of 13 Duquesne turnovers. Kent had 12 turnovers, second lowest of the year.
• Duquesne outscored Kent State in the point (34-18), on second-chance pointers (17-13), and on fast breaks (10-5).
• Two Duquesne players had double-doubles: Amaya Hamilton with 22 points and 12 rebounds and Megan McConnell with 11 points and 12 rebounds. McConnell also had eight assists; she has already had two triple-doubles this season. Myers led Duquesne with 23 points.
• All five Duquesne starters played at least 38 minutes.

The MAC and the Mid-Majors

Five Mid-American Conference teams were ranked in this week’s Mid-Major Top 25. Toledo (6-2) was fifth, Kent State (then 5-2) was ninth, Northern Illinois (7-1) was 13th, Bowling Green (6-1) was 14th and Ball State (5-2) was 19th.

Next: Hiram on Sunday

The Flashes play Division III Hiram at 2 p.m. Sunday, then break for exams. They will play Otterbein, another Division III school, on Dec. 20.

Box score

Kent State finished a brutal first six games of its season with a Thanksgiving tournament championship.

The Flashes beat Southern Illinois 72-66 Sunday to win the Christmas City Classic in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

“If someone had told us at the beginning of the season that we’d be 4-2, the staff would have said, ‘We’ll take that right now,'” coach Todd Starkey said. “We were playing three Power 5s and three really good mid-majors. We could potentially have gone 0-6.”

Southern Illinois is 1-5 on the season. Quinnipiac, the team KSU beat 58-55 in the first game of the tournament, took third place with a 67-64 win over host Lehigh.

Five players played special roles in the victory.

LINDSEY THALL scored KSU’s first nine points on three 3-point baskets. She went on to score 20 points of 6-of-11 shooting and 4-of-7 three-pointers. Thall is the Flashes’ all-time leader in 3-point baskets with 231.

“Lindsey hasn’t been shooting the ball well until today,” Starkey said. “But with a player like that, you just keep going to them and let them shoot through it.”

Thall, who scored 18 points in KSU’s 58-55 win over Quinnipiac Saturday, was the tournament’s most valuable player.

CASEY SANTORO also made the all-tournament team. She scored 15 points and made 9-of-11 free throws, including eight in the fourth quarter.

“She played two really tough games,” Starkey said. “When you handle the ball as much as she does, you’re going to make some mistakes. But she did a really good job of playing through those mistakes. She did a really good job of handling pressure yesterday and today.”

Thall and Santoro drew 18 fouls between them against Quinnipiac. Against SIU, they drew 13 more.

CLARE KELLY played 37 minutes, a career high and the most for a Kent State player this season, and scored 12 points. She made 3-of-4 three-point shots.

“She was really dialed in today,’ Starkey said. “And her defensive effort was phenomenal.”

DIONNA GRAY had only played 16 minutes and scored six points through the first five games of her freshman year. On Sunday, she scored 10 points in 12 minutes.

“She gave us a big spark in the second quarter when Casey was in foul trouble and Corrynne Hauser rolled an ankle,” Starkey said.

HANNAH YOUNG had 10 rebounds, the most for any KSU player this season, and scored eight points.

Through the first 29 minutes, the Flashes held SIU to 24% shooting.

“We’ve learned that we can trust and rely on our defense,” Starkey said. “We’ve got a lot of players on the court with a lot of experience and who have played together. I think they have a lot more confidence in in each other.”

In the third period, Southern Illinois made only 1-of-14 shots as Kent State build a 49-29 lead.

But in the last minute of the quarter, in Starkey’s words, some “crazy things” happened.

“We got a no-call (of a foul) that I got an apology for,” Starkey said. “Then they scored on the next trip down. Then we had a missed shot, and they hit a 65- or 70-foot shot.

“I think it gave them just enough hope. Then they scored the first five in the fourth quarter.”

The run started the Salukis to their best — and Kent State’s worst — quarter of the year.

Southern outscored KSU 32-23 in the period and closed the margin to six points in the last minute.

Running the numbers

Better shooting: The Flashes made 10-of-22 three-point attempts. Their 45.5 percentage was 10 points higher than any other game this season.

Turnover trouble: Kent State committed nine turnovers in the first quarter and six more in the second against a high-pressure SIU defense. KSU was able to cut the number to seven in the second half.

Other statistical notes:

• Kent outrebounded a taller SIU team 40-39.
• The Flashes had eight steals, their most of the season. Hauser had three of them in the six minutes she played. SIU had 11 steals.
• Kent outscored the Salukis 20-8 on free throws.
• KSU’s bench was outscored for the first time this season (18-12).
• Southern Illinois outscored Kent off turnovers (20-17), in the paint (34-22) and on second changes (20-8).

Next: Home on Saturday

The Flashes are back in Kent for the first time in three weeks when they host St. Bonaventure at 2 p.m. Sunday. The Bonnies are 1-5 and lost three games at Cleveland State’s Thanksgiving tournament.

Box score

With 4.7 seconds left, freshman Corrynne Hauser made the biggest play of her young career to win Kent State’s game against Oklahoma State Sunday.

With 1.3 seconds left, graduate student Hannah Young made a critical defensive play to preserve the victory.

In two minutes around the beginning of the fourth quarter, grad student Lindsey Thall scored 10 straight points —the biggest scoring run of her five-year career — to keep Kent State in the game.

And for 34 minutes, senior Katie Shumate played big-time basketball against a big-time opponent, scoring 23 points to lead the Kent State women’s basketball team past Oklahoma State of the Big 12 59-56.

It was the Flashes’ third win against a Power 5 opponent in two years (they beat UCLA and Penn State last year) and evens their record at 2-2. Both of KSU’s losses this season have been to Power 5 teams — 80-71 to Florida State in this season’s opener in Kent and 80-59 at Arkansas on Thursday.

Oklahoma State is 4-1. Before the Kent State game, the Cowgirls had averaged 90 points a game.

“It’s a big, big win for our program,” coach Todd Starkey said. “These are the type of games we want to play. They prepare us for a tough conference schedule.

“It’s great for our players. These are memories that they’ll remember for their lifetimes.” 

Starkey said a key to the game was Kent State controlling the pace.

“We knew they wanted to run and they wanted to play fast,” he said. “We needed to try to control that. And we did a really good job of controlling the tempo, making them have to defend multiple sets.

“We wanted to execute an offense that made them guard multiple screening actions. So we were making them defend 20 or 25 seconds of a shot clock. If you do that enough times in a game, it reduces the number of possessions the other team gets.”

Hauser’s winning shot

Here is a look at Corynne Hauser’s game-winner.#GoFlashes⚡️ pic.twitter.com/qx0W9sDhEj

— Kent State Women’s Basketball (@KentStWBB) November 20, 2022

Oklahoma State had just missed two free throws when Kent State called timeout with 11 seconds to go and advanced the ball to its front court.

Hauser took the inbounds pass and moved to the left elbow, spun and drove to the basket. Leaning far to the left, she put the layup in with her left hand, and the Flashes were in the lead.

“We wanted the ball in her hands,” Starkey said. “We were trying to get a ball screen set with Lindsey involved, and Corynne saw a little opening there.

“She’s a player who likes the ball in her hands and wants big shots. She didn’t have a particularly great shooting day, but she made that one when counted. You want players who want to take the big shot. She’s certainly one of them.”

Young’s leaping defense

After Hauser scored, Oklahoma State called timeout and advanced the ball.

From the sideline, OSU’s Terryn Milton sent a looping pass to the right of the basket, where Taylen Collins was cutting toward the net. Young, who is 5-10, leaped into the air and batted the ball to Shumate, who was fouled. Shumate made both shots with a second to go.

“It was a great, great play,” Starkey said. “Hannah got banged around quite a bit in that game, but she kept playing tough. It’s great when a fifth-year senior can make a play like that down the stretch, when it really matters.”

Thall’s 10-point run

Thall, KSU’s second-leading scorer, hadn’t scored Sunday until she hit a short jump shot with four seconds to go in the third quarter.

Then she took over the game.

She scored on a layup 57 seconds into the fourth period, then made a jumper, a free throw and a 3-point basket in the next 90 seconds. She single-handedly had taken the Flashes from a six-point deficit to a 49-48 lead.

The first and last baskets of Thall’s streak:

10 straight for Lindsey Thall 🔥

KSU 48, OSU 47 pic.twitter.com/8o6wBi1AFt

— Kent State Women’s Basketball (@KentStWBB) November 20, 2022

From there on, the teams played within three points of each other.

“We started to play through Lindsey, and that was huge,” Starkey said. “I sometimes think that gets overshadowed in the box score. The timeliness of those 10 points was really big.”

Shumate’s big game

Shumate, 5-11 guard, has led Kent State in scoring in three of the team’s four games. (She was one behind the leader in the other.)

At Oklahoma State, she scored at least four points in every quarter, finishing with nine in the fourth. She led the Flashes with 23 points, eight rebounds and three steals.

“Katie was really good at being aggressive,” Starkey said, “and when she’s aggressive like that, she’s a tough matchup for anybody. 

“Early in the game, we felt we had a bit of a mismatch and were trying to play through her.”

Running the numbers

• In Oklahoma State’s four first games, the Cowgirls had averaged 49% shooting and 44% from 3-point distance. Against Kent State, OSU shot 31% and 22% on 3-pointers.
• Kent State made 36% of its shots and 21% of its 3-point attempts.
• The Flashes outrebounded Oklahoma State 43-41. Shumate led with eight. Thall, Young and sophomore Bridget Dunn had six.
• Kent State’s bench outscored OSU’s 17-9. KSU reserves have outscored their opponents in every game this season.
• The lead changed hands 17 times, and the score was tied seven times.
• Ten Flashes played at least eight minutes, with nine playing at least 10. Nine scored.

Next: A holiday tournament in Bethlehem

The Flashes play Quinnipiac, a consistently strong mid-major, at 2:30 p.m. Saturday in the first round of the Christmas City Classic in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Quinnipiac is 2-2, with 30-point losses to No. 10 North Carolina State and No. 12 Indiana. The Bobcats have beat Hartford by 55 and Central Connecticut by 28.

In the tournament’s second game on Sunday, the Flashes will play Leheigh (2-2) or Southern Illinois (0-3).

Box score