BGSU Sports Teams Make their Mark in 2018-19

Hockey, men’s basketball, women’s soccer, volleyball teams at top of their game

By Matt Markey ’76
 
With excellence as their mutually expressed goal, the type of playing surface did not seem to matter. Several Falcon teams achieved exceptional success recently, and they did so on the ice, on the grass and a couple on the hardwood.
 
The Falcon hockey, men’s basketball, women’s soccer and volleyball teams all played at a championship level, making their mark in conference action — and in the postseason.
 
Bowling Green Hockey returned to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in nearly three decades, after advancing to the title game of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association conference tournament for the second time in three years.
 
“I think that with the accomplishments of the past season, and the progress the program has made in recent years, Bowling Green Hockey has some very positive momentum going right now,” booster Scott Slater ’73 said. “It is very encouraging to see what’s taken place here.”
 
The Falcons, who finished 25-11-5, lost a heartbreaking 2-1 overtime decision to defending national champion Minnesota-Duluth in the NCAA Tournament. Duluth is the same school BGSU defeated 5-4 in four overtimes to give the Falcons the 1984 National Championship.

“When I came to Bowling Green, I thought I knew how important hockey was to this place; I didn’t know, but I found out,” Coach Chris Bergeron said before accepting the same position at his alma mater, Miami University, after the team’s NCAA Tournament appearance. “From the students on campus, the community, the boosters, the former players and all of the NHL guys — the support BGSU hockey receives is tremendous. This is a place where hockey really, really matters, and that’s due to the depth of the commitment from everyone involved.”
 
Bowling Green swept past Michigan Tech and Northern Michigan to reach the WCHA conference tournament championship game, before dropping the title contest to Minnesota State 3-2 in overtime. Slater said reaching the elite field for the NCAA Tournament was a significant milestone, and after posting a 20-win season for the fifth year in a row, BGSU had the rest of the country taking notice.
 
“I think the greater hockey community considers us relevant again, and that is very important,” he said. “I would say we are considered by many as one of the top 15 programs in the country again. We haven’t gotten all of the way yet, but the program is in good shape and it kind of gives you chills to see the level of support it receives.”
 
Men’s Basketball didn’t just shrug off the reduced expectations of a preseason poll that put the Falcons at the bottom of the Mid-American Conference’s East Division, they flipped the script and charged out to a league-leading 7-1 start in the MAC, the best conference start since the Nate Thurmond-Howard Komives team in 1961-62.
 
“It took a while, but eventually I knew we had something special going here,” coach and former Falcon standout Michael Huger said. “The players showed that they were willing to stick together when times got hard. They didn’t quit on each other, and that allowed us to be successful.”
 
One of the highlights of the season was a 92-88 win over No. 18 Buffalo in front of a raucous, record-breaking, standing-room only Stroh Center crowd of 5,000 fans. It was BGSU’s first win over a Top 25 team since the 2008 season. The Falcons would advance to the championship game of the MAC Tournament before falling to Buffalo by an 87-73 score.
 
They finished the season 22-12 overall and went 12-6 in the MAC. Huger said that
it was very gratifying to reach the MAC Tournament final, and with that success comes the hunger for more.
 
“It was a long, hard road to get to where we are, but also so much fun to see what
we are capable of accomplishing,” he said. “We did something we weren’t supposed to do, and now with that comes expectations, and we have to embrace that with a sense of urgency, now that we know what it takes.”
 
The women’s soccer team had one of the best seasons in program history, winning both the MAC regular season and tournament titles, posting a 10-1-0 conference record, a 14-5-3 overall mark, and advancing to the NCAA Tournament. A school record five Falcons were first-team All-MAC, senior Erica Hubert was named the MAC Offensive Player of the Year and junior Maureen Kennedy was the MAC Defensive
 
Player of the Year, and Matt Fannon was the MAC Coach of the Year for the second consecutive season.
 
“One of the reasons I think we were successful is that the only thing that ever really mattered was the next game,” Fannon said. “We made a point of just concentrating on what was at stake on that particular day. We wanted to hit the very specific things that would make a difference, and we kept working on having that winning mentality.”
 
The volleyball team went 19-12 overall, and 13-3 in the conference while winning its second straight MAC regular-season crown. The Falcons advanced to the National Invitational Volleyball Championship before losing an extremely close five-set match to Bradley.
 
Senior libero Kallie Seimet became the first player in MAC history to be named the MAC Player of the Year and MAC Defensive Player of the Year in two consecutive seasons. Head Coach Danijela Tomic said a championship environment is responsible for the program’s success.
 
“We have a special team culture here, where individuals have surrendered ‘I’ for ‘we’, where our players play for each other, and for something bigger than themselves,” she said. “When you have all that, you know you’ve created a championship culture and mindset.”