The unofficial online home for fans of the Kent State University Golden Flashes. Part of Collegiate Sports Nation (CSN).

Kent State hosts league-champion Ohio at 7 Wednesday at the MACC. It's the first of two home games in this last week of the regular season. They'll finish at 2 p.m. Saturday against Buffalo.

The Flashes lost to Ohio 58-44 in Athens after leading 24-22 at halftime. It was the second fewest points Ohio has scored all season. As is often the case, 25 turnovers proved to be Kent State's undoing, along with 51 percent shooting by Ohio in the second half.

Ohio is fourth in the nation in three-point shooting. The Bobcats are 23-4, 14-2 in the conference. A year ago they were 9-21 and tied with Kent State and Miami for last in the MAC at 4-14.

Full preview on the blog at http://wbbflashes.com.

Lost 69-56 to first place Ohio (15-2). We were not embarrassed but they took a 37-24 lead early in the second half and we never made a run. Ohio was just too quick and made shots when they needed. The big disappointment was Lurkin. She shot worse than Manley did against Miami. Two for nine from three and one for eight from two. All of them were good looks. She was open tonight more than I have ever seen. Just couldn't knock it down.

Kent State has played OK against league-leading Ohio, losing by 14 in Athens and 13 in Kent. But going into the tournament, OU is class of the league -- three games ahead of second-place Ball State. Akron is third.

Besides Lurken, point guard Mikell Chinn and forward Jordan Korinek had rough games. Chinn, who's been a key factor in KSU's good play over the last month, made six turnovers and fouled out. Korinek, who is fourth in the MAC in shooting percentage, was 2 for 8.

Montia Johnson, who was last year's leading scorer but missed almost six weeks with a concussion, had 13 points and six rebounds in 11 minutes. Cici Shannon had 11 points and 11 rebounds -- her eighth double-double of the year.

Full game story on the blog at http://wbbflashes.com.

Redshirt junior guard Melanee Stubbs probably won't be back for a final season next year.

Coach Danny O'Banion said that Stubbs, who missed all of last year with a knee injury, is graduating in May and will be honored with Kent's other three seniors at Senior Day Saturday. I knew that Stubbs had planned to go the medical school but hadn't heard before this week that she wouldn't be back for a redshirt season. She is a tri-captain who has started 17 games at wing.

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The latest from the MAC office has Kent playing Western Michigan if the tournament started today. Western is tied with three other teams at 10-7. Akron is 11-6. So things are still very much up in the air.

More on both stories on the blog at http://wbbflashes.com.

I enjoyed watching Mel and will miss not seeing her next year. She played hard and gave it her all through difficult times. She gave the team a spark when she was healthy.

Kent State plays its last home game of the season at 2 p.m. Saturday against Buffalo.

I'm running off to the men's game, but a preview is on the blog at http://wbbflashes.com.

More of the same as we lost 68-58 to Buffalo. i continue to be amazed at what I see. Lurkin hits two threes when we still had a chance and goes to the bench for 3-4 minutes. Shannon makes a nice move and goes to the bench for about the same. They had a musical chairs competition during one timeout and the team used that strategy today. Oh well what's the difference between 5-24 and 6-23. Once again they decided to honor the seniors after the game. I doubt I would have waited until after the game when Shaw, Thomas, Huffman and Mitchell graduated. We play EMU Monday night. They beat us by 17 in the ninth conference game. We are a bit better now so if they take us lightly maybe we can get lucky. I have always been told hope is not a course of action. However that's all we have.

The good news is the women's team has won 20+ games during the last Olympiad.

As they've been more most of the second half of the season, they were competitive.

But after being down 31-29 at halftime, they missed 10 of their first 11 shots of the second half and got outrebounded 26-16 in the second half.

Cici Shannon finished her MAC Center career with her ninth double-double of the season -- 16 points, 10 rebounds, 3 blocks and 4 steals.

Full story on the blog at http://wbbflashes.com.

My only comments about the game: Why do they short change the women's team on Senior recognition by having the celebration after the game? They had a decent crowd but few were left at the end. The true supporters I guess. Still I feel it is a downer for individuals who should also have their time to be better recognized to the crowd.

I have been at all but a handful of games since 1991 and did not stay. It's unfair to expect fans to stick around for 15-20 minutes to see the ceremony. It's the only team that does it as far as I know and it's a team that can't afford to inconvenience the few fans they have. I assume its a coaches decision and I believe she should reconsider. She'll have two years to think about it.

Kent plays at Eastern Michigan at 5 p.m. Monday in the first round of the MAC tournament.

Eastern (18-11, 11-7 in the MAC) is the hottest team in the conference after champion Ohio, having won four in a row and eight of its last 10. The first win in that stretch was a 70-53 win over Kent State Feb. 4. In that game, the Eagles scored 19 points off of 13 KSU first-half turnovers on their way to a 39-24 halftime lead. Kent State cut down the turnovers and limited EMU to 25 percent shooting in the second half, but the game was all but over at halftime.

Eastern is second in the conference in forcing turnovers and scores 27 percent of its points off them. Ball handling has been a problem all season for Kent; if it can't keep turnovers down Monday, it doesn't have much chance.

Kent is 5-24, 3-15 in the MAC. It finished 11th in the conference (fifth in the East), ahead of only Bowling Green.

Preview on the blog at http://wbbflashes.com.

The women led Eastern Michigan at halftime 28-27 but lost 70-52.

Like most of the season, they played well in spots but not well enough to win. Eastern shot 57 percent in the second half and scored 19 points off 17 Kent State turnovers.

Cici Shannon finished her career with her 10th double-double of the year, scoring 12 points and getting 10 rebounds.

Story on the blog at http://wbbflashes.com.

Shannon was named third-team all-MAC. A post on that and the rest of the league selections also is on the blog.