by Bowling Green; OH It was a road conference affair as the Akron Zips traveled just over two hours away and came out with a 77-67 victory over the Bowling Green Falcons. The win puts Akron at 12-4 on the season while also improving to 3-1 in the MAC. Thanks to 38 bench points and four players scoring in double digits, it was a nice road win despite a tale of two halves. “That was a very interesting game,” head coach John Groce said postgame. “We got off to the big lead and were playing well, but getting into foul trouble hurt us.”
Despite the foul trouble and playing just 20 minutes, Amani Lyles led the way with his second double-double of the season tallying up 18 points and 10 rebounds. Bowen Hardman followed up with 15 points and three rebounds while tying his season-high with five made shots from beyond the arc. “Hardman did a good job shooting them out of the zone,” Groce said about helping out the offense when BG began a comeback. While Eric Mahaffey finished with 14 points, seven rebounds, and one assist.
The Zips started off with a 13-2 run as they were shooting at a 56% clip. In fact, they were so locked in on both sides of the floor, the road team silenced the home crowd with a 24-4 lead by time the under-12 media timeout arrived.
But the Falcons would respond with a little 10-5 run themselves as they tried to slowly chip away at the deficit cutting it down to 29-14 with 7:14 left in the half. It was the home team’s turn to get their offense going as they cut it all the way down to 32-22 forcing Groce to use a timeout. Akron ended the first half on a high note with a 11-5 run which was very important in this game. With a 43-27 halftime lead, they knew the home team would refuse to down easy.
Bowling Green did more than that as they came out of the second half with a 15-4 run cutting it down to a five point deficit. With a 48-42 Zips lead, it began to become a game again. “I thought we did a good job on Javontae Campbell making him inefficient, but Mayar Wol was electric tonight putting up 32 points,” Groce said about tonight’s performance defensively.
Things would get even tighter as the Falcons would cut it all the way down to a 64-61 deficit at the under-4 media timeout. The second half completely got the home crowd back into it. Leave it up for the best coach in the MAC to get things under control for Akron though as they were able to retake a double digit lead with a 7-0 run out of the media timeout.
With not much left in the tank for Bowling Green, they fell short once again after a gauntlent of a MAC schedule featuring Miami, UMass, Kent State, and the Zips themselves. Groce summed it perfectly after the game saying “you got through the good, the bad, and the ugly and saw it all across 40 minutes.” The 77-67 win now gives Akron some more momentum as they head home to face Ball State on Tuesday night.
