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2021 Mid-American Conference Men’s Basketball Game Recaps: Feb. 2

It was Groundhog Day in the MAC, and the conference declared another five weeks of exciting basketball, starting on Tuesday night.

COLLEGE BASKETBALL: FEB 25 Miami OH at Kent State
Kent State’s Danny Pippen led the Golden Flashes to victory tonight.
Photo by Frank Jansky/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

The road to Cleveland got a little easier to tred for the conference-leading Toledo Rockets, as they defeated the Akron Zips by a score of 91-76 at home on Tuesday night. The Rockets were led by JT Schumate’s 25 points, but the Zips didn’t go down without a fight, as Loren Christian Jackson lead all scorers with 31 points. With an 11-1 record in the MAC, the Rockets seem inevitable in terms of locking down the 1 seed. With their loss, the Zips find themselves still in 2nd place, with not a lot of time to make up spots.

Kent State found themselves maintaining the three-seed with their 76-68 victory over the Miami RedHawks. The Golden Flashes were led by Danny Pippen with 30 points. The Redhawks leading scorer was Dae Dae Grant with 17 points. Miami, who fell to a 5-4 MAC record, fall out of the fourth seed as a result of the loss, landing in the fifth spot.

The Central Michigan Chippewas did not prove to be any trouble for the Ohio Bobcats, as they were downed by a score of 69 to 83 on their home court to bring about the team’s fifth-straight loss. The Bobcats were led by Jason Preston with 17 points and the Chippewas leading scorer was Travon Broadway with 26 points. The game granted Ohio the rights to the fourth-place seed, after Miami’s loss to Kent State. The only thing saving the Chippewas from the basement at this point are their intra-state rivals, Western, who are currently living there.

The Buffalo Bulls had not trouble downing the Ball State Cardinals by a score of 78 to 58. The Bulls were led by Joshua Mballa with 22 points. While Ishmael El-Amin would lead the Cardinals with the same number of points.

The Bowling Green at Eastern Michigan game on Tuesday night, which we were set to report from, was unfortunately postponed earlier in the week. Because of the MAC’s COVID protocols, the games between Eastern Michigan, Ohio and Miami have also been postponed. Also affected buy postponements were two games for NIU, who would have faced WMU mid-week and CMU during the weekend.

Replacement dates have not been scheduled as of publication.

Our previews for the weekend slate of games will come out on Friday afternoon on our website.