BGSU 67, Temple 64 — If there's a pattern this season, it's the Falcons inexplicably beating Temple at sports. They outlasted the football Owls 13-10, then waited a couple months and matched TU bucket for bucket until the final whistle. The big plays were handled in the final minute by the diminutive Jordon Crawford, who nailed a 3-point shot with 30 seconds to play to take the lead, then fed A'uston Calhoun with a dunk to seal the victory. The Big Apostrophe had 16 points and seven assists.
Temple was reeling with injuries and played with a mere seven players, but in a game where neither team led by more than six, the Falcons just made a couple extra plays at the end. BGSU is now 4-2, and Temple's 13-game win streak against the MAC was snapped (last MAC loss: 68-52 on 12/3/08 vs. Miami).
Michigan State 72, EMU 40 — Big beautiful credit goes to Tom Izzo and MSU for traveling to a MAC arena, thereby bucking Jud Heathcote's knee-jerk prophecy after the Spartans lost at BGSU in 1990. This was their first trip to a Mid-American venue in 21 seasons. Charlie Coles would be proud. And it went about as swimmingly as it would've been had the game been in East Lansing.
EMU just doesn't have the personnel to match up against Big Ten opponents right now. Darrell Lampley was their best chance to score points but he was bottled up nicely by the Spartans. J.R. Sims got the most looks and finished with 14 points. Jamell Harris did well on defense with four blocks, seven rebounds and four points.
Ball State 74, Calumet College 39 – Ball State beat up on an NAIA team by a lot of points. End of recap.
Women's games:
EMU 65, Canisius 53 — After having a lackluster first half, the Eagles ratcheted up the scoring with 42 points in the latter half. The unlikely catalyst in the game was sophomore guard Natachia Watkins, going off for 21 points, seven rebounds and four steals. Tavelyn James had a horrendous shooting night (0-for-10 on 3-pointers) but did finish with 14 points.
Arkansas State 64, Toledo 56 — Big upset here, since the Red Wolves were just 1-2 coming into the game. Naama Shafir, arguably Toledo's top player, missed yet another game due to her knee injury sustained in the previous game. UT had to play catch-up after being down 12 at half and made it within four points with a minute left. Shafir replacement Haylie Linn did well enough with seven assists and nine points but doesn't appear to be enough of a scoring threat. Courtney Ingersoll led Toledo with 15 points on nine shots. Still no timetable on Shafir's return.
Fairleigh Dickinson 63, Buffalo 54 — The post-Kourtney Brown woes continue as the Bulls slip to 2-5 early in the season. Give credit to UB; they hung close for most of the affair but just couldn't buy a basket whenever they needed one, and shot just 33.1% on eFG. Yet again, Brittany Hedderson led with 17 points, four rebounds and four assists.
Today's men's games:
7:00 p.m. — Akron at West Virginia (ESPN Full Court/ESPN3)
7:00 p.m. — Louisiana-Lafayette at Kent State
9:05 p.m. — NIU at Utah Valley
Today's women's games: none