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

The KSU women open their season at Northern Kentucky at 7 p.m. Wednesday on ESPN+.

The Flashes are loaded. They return all five starters from the team that finished fifth in the MAC last season despite two shutdowns over COVID-19. They also have their next three top scorers, plus two Power 5 transfers.

But Ohio, Bowling Green and Buffalo also have most everybody back and were picked 1-2-3 in the conference in the coaches poll last week. KSU was picked fourth, Eastern Michigan fifth and Central Michigan, which lost three starters to graduation, sixth.

Returning KSU starters are:

• Junior forward Nila Blackford, a second-team all-MAC player last year and a preseason second-team member this season. She was the only post player on the first or second team. Coach Todd Starkey says Blackford has worked hard on her passing to work out of being double-teamed under the basket. She averaged 15.5 points and 10.6 rebounds a game last season.

• Junior guard Katie Shumate, who was all-conference honorable mention last year despite season-long knee problems. She’s been at 100% in practice, Starkey says. Shumate averaged 12.2 points a game last season/

• Senior forward Lindsey Thall, a member of the MAC’s all-defense team the last two years. She started every game for Kent State in her first three years on campus and has led the league in blocked shots every season. She almost certainly will score her 1,000th career point before Christmas (she has 909).

• Senior point guard Mariah Modkins, who started every game last season, led the team in assists and made 37.1% of her 3-point shots.

• Junior guard Clare Kelly, a top 3-point shooter who was fourth on the team in scoring at 8.8 points per game.

Behind them are five experienced players who could give KSU its first 10-player rotation in Starkey’s six years in Kent. They are:

• Sophomore point guard Casey Santoro, a 2,200-point scorer in high school who averaged 21 minutes a game last season.

• Senior guard Hannah Young, a key backup for three seasons who had 15 rebounds in a game last season.

• Junior guard Abby Ogle, a third-team all-American junior college player in 2020. She played five games for West Virginia last season. Starkey calls her the best passer on the team and a good threat to steal the ball on defense.

• Junior center Bexley Wallace, a 6-3 transfer from Penn State who missed last season with an Achilles tendon injury. Starkey says she’ll likely play in short spurts early in the season. She was a top 100 recruit out of Pickerington Central High School.

• Sophomore center Lexi Jackson, the tallest player on the team at 6-4. She was the first post player off the bench at the end of the 2021-22 season.

Starkey said freshmen Bridget Dunn, a 6-3 all-state forward from Indiana, and Jenna Batsch, a 6-1 guard from Loveland, Ohio, had looked good in practice.

Northern Kentucky is picked fourth in the Horizon League this season after an 8-11 record last year (7-5 in conference play). Guard Lindsey Duvall was named to the preseason all-Horizon first team and guard Ivy Turner to the second team. Forward Grayson Rose made the league all-defensive team last season.

Kent State’s home opener is at 2 p.m. Sunday against Saint Francis of Pennsylvania, which beat the Flashes 67-64 last season and went on to a 14-9 record.

There’s more to catch up on the women’s team, but the headlines are:
• Wednesday is early signing day for the 2022 recruiting class. I know of verbal commitments from all-state guards from Pennsylvania and West Virginia and a power forward from Illinois.
• Starkey signed a contract extension through 2025-26.
• The Flashes will play No. 20 UCLA in the first round of the Gulf Coast Classic, one of the nation’s top non-conference tournaments.
• No. 16 Florida State will play Kent State at the M.A.C. Center on Dec. 21 in the first game of a doubleheader with the KSU men, who will play Cleveland State. The women will tip at 4 p.m.

There’s a little more detail on the blog in posts about the opener and the outlook for the season. It’s at HTTP://wbbFlashes.com.

Thanks, cschierh. Good job!

One addition to your brief discussion of the league's other teams: While Bowling Green returns almost everyone, the Falcons' best player, Lexi Fleming, is out for the year with an injury.

The women opened with an 80-73 win at Northern Kentucky as sophomore point guard Casey Santoro had 19 points, nine in the last three minutes.

The Flashes showed the most depth I've seen in coach Todd Starkey's five (now his sixth) seasons. Nine players played more than 16 minutes. Four scored in double figures. Seven scored at least seven points.

Lindsey Thall was the only player to go more than 30 minutes (she played 37). In previous seasons, KSU sometimes had five people play more than 30.

Thall had a fancy scorebook line: 17 points, three 3-pointers, a team-leading eight rebounds, three blocked shots, three steals and two assists.

Senior guard Hannah Young made her first early season start (she had started a few games in midseason because of injuries). She scored 11 points, had six rebounds and blocked two shots. Nila Blackford, last year's leading scorer, had 10 points, all in the second half.

West Virginia transfer Abby Ogle, a 2020 junior college all-American, had eight points, three steals and three assists. Freshman forward Bridget Dunn had seven points, four rebounds and a steal. Junior Katie Shumate had eight points.

The game was close throughout. KSU led by as many as 10, NKU by as many as eight. Kent led 67-66 when Santoro hit a 3-point shot with 1:08 to go, after which the Flashes pulled away.

KSU shot 50.9% from the field and 50% from 3-point distance. Northern Kentucky made 45% of its shots.

Northern Kentucky is a decent team, picked to finish fourth in the Horizon League. Its best player, a transfer from Louisville, scored 27 points.

Story is on the blog at HTTP://wbbFlashes.com.

A Kent women’s team that actually shoots well!! This could be pretty exciting (and unique). It would be nice to be the better shooting team on the court for once.

Kent State's 2022 recruiting class includes three really good guards from three states. They are:

DIONNA GRAY, 5-4 point guard from Huntington, West Virginia. MaxPreps named her West Virginia player of the year last season. Prep Hoop Girls has her as the No. 2 recruit in the state in the class of 2022. She averaged 17.2 points 6.2 assists, 5.3 steals and 4.2 rebounds as a junior.

CORYNNE HAUSER, a 5-7 guard from Rochester, Pennsylvania. She was a first-team all-state selection last season, when she averaged 19.9 points, 7.2 rebounds, 5.2 assists and 3.4 steals. Coach Todd Starkey calls her "one of the most dynamic playmakers we've recruited."

TATIANA THOMAS, a 5-10 wing from Bolingbrook, Illinois. She averaged 10 points, 8.5 rebounds and three assists last season despite not being the top scoring option on her team. Her high school coach called her a "rebounding machine."

Starkey said the three were "can't miss" players, comparable to the 2019 class of Nila Blackford, Katie Shumate and Clare Kelly. Blackford was second-team all-MAC last season and Shumate honorable mention are sophomore. Kelly started 13 games last season.

All three were highly recruited. Hauser had more than 20 Division I offers.

Lots more detail is on the blog at HTTP://wbbFlashes.com.

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Flashes' home opener is at 2 p.m. Sunday against Saint Francis of Pennsylvania at the M.A.C. Center.

KSU beat Northern Kentucky 80-73 Thursday while Saint Francis, picked to finish third in the North East Conference, lost to Marshall 73-53.

The women, who played great offense in beating Northern Kentucky Wednesday, played great defense to win their second game on Sunday.

They beat Saint Francis of Pennsylvania 71-45, holding them to 13 fewer points than any team KSU played last season. The 26-point margin was Kent's biggest since November 2018.

The Flashes smothered the Saint Francis offense, rarely allowing a full offensive set and holding the Red Flash to 49 shots, also fewer than any game last season.

Katie Shumate, who scored eight points last Wednesday, had 21 on Sunday, 19 of them in the first half. Nila Blackford had 12 and Lindsey Thall and Bridget Dunn eight each. All 13 healthy Flashes got in the game. Twelve of them scored.

Thall, who has led KSU in rebounding both games, had seven and Hanna Young six. Casey Santoro had five assists and Clare Kelly three steals.

Kent next plays an 11 a.m. Thursday "education day" game against Division III John Carroll.

A story is on the blog at HTTP://wbbFlashes.com.

Kent State has won its first two games against solid mid-majors, showing good offense in one game and very good defense in the other.

The Flashes' third game is Thursday morning against Division III John Carroll. It's "Education Day," in which Kent State invites hundreds of public school students to a midday game.

The Flashes are strong favorites, even though John Carroll is a very good Division III program. The Blue Streaks are ranked eighth in the country in their division and are a unanimous choice to win the Ohio Athletic Conference for the third year in a row. They're 2-0, having won their own tipoff tournament last weekend with wins over Case Western and Carnegie Mellon.

But like all Division III schools, John Carroll offers no athletic scholarships while Division I programs like Kent State can offer 15. John Carroll's best player — grad student wing Nicole Hefferington was honorable mention all-Ohio at Solon High School. KSU has seven first-team all-state players on its roster. Hefferington is still a good one; she was a Division III first-team All-American last season.

Kent State made 51% of its shots in its opening 80-73 win over Northern Kentucky, a higher percentage than they made in any game last season. The Flashes scored 80 points only twice last season.

In its second game, KSU beat Saint Francis of Pennsylvania 71-45. That was an opponent's lowest point total since 2018.

Both Northern Kentucky and Saint Francis look to be solid mid-major teams this season; Northern Kentucky was picked to finish third in the Horizon League, Saint Francis third in the North East Conference.

"They were two good performances, two different types of wins," coach Todd Starkey said. "It tells us early on that we have the ability to win in different ways."

Junior guard Katie Shumate, sophomore guard Casey Santoro, Senior forward Lindsay Thall and junior forward Nila Blackford all average in double figures for the Flashes. Nine different players average more than 12 minutes a game.

"We have size off the bench that has ability," Starkey said. "Our guard depth is good, and we have different types of guards. So we have the ability to do different types of lineups. If we need to get more aggressive, we can. If we need to play ball control and focus on where we're trying to get the ball, we can play that way. It's a nice luxury to have."

The Flashes has scheduled a non-Division I team most years in Starkey's time in Kent. This season, they also play Division II Clarion on Dec. 11. Why schedule them?

"We have to have some balance in there," Starkey said. "We've got some really tough games in there. We're playing in one of the toughest preseason non-conference tournaments in the country. We have Florida State (currently ranked 17th) coming in here (Dec. 21 at the M.A.C. Center)."

After Thursday's game, the Flashes will have a week to prepare for that tournament, the Gulf Coast Showcase. The Flashes will open with No. 20 UCLA. Then they could play South Dakota, one of the top mid-major programs in the country, and could meet No. 14 Iowa State. The field also includes Penn State of the Big Ten, St. Johns of the Big East and Massachusetts of the Atlantic 10.

This is a cut and pasted from the wbbFlashes.com blog, so there's no link to follow. The blog does have a detailed post on the Flashes' outstanding three-guard recruiting class at https://wbbflashes.com/2021/11/13/recruiting-2022/.

The women destroyed John Carroll, a good Division III team, 101-40 in a Thursday morning "Kids Day" game.

Flashes are 3-0 going into a game with UCLA in a Florida tournament next week. It was the first time in 21 years KSU had scored 100 points. It also was coach Todd Starkey's 250th victory (85 of which have been at Kent).

Kent State shot almost 50% from field and 3-point distance. Flashes forced 29 turnovers and scored 52 points -- almost a basket every turnover.

Sophomore Casey Santoro led KSU with 19 points. She played 27 minutes. No one else played more than 20. All 12 players who got into the game scored and played at least seven minutes. Freshman forward Bridget Dunn, who looks increasingly like the Lindsey Thall of the future, had 11 points and two 3-pointers. Thall herself had 15 points.

Hannah Young had 11 points and led KSU with eight rebounds. In the crowd of more than 1,000 Kent elementary students were a few dozen she works with in her student teaching.

John Carroll is ranked eighth in the country in Division III.

It was a fun morning. Story with more color and quotes is on the blog at http://wbbFlashes.com.

The women head to Florida to find out how good they really are.

The Flashes are 3-0, with solid wins over mid-majors Northern Kentucky and Saint Francis of Pennsylvania and a rout of Division III John Carroll.

Friday they open the Gulf Coast Showcase, one of Division I's most competitive non-conference tournaments, against No. 19 UCLA.

The game is at 1:30 p.m. and will be streamed on FloHoops at https://www.flohoops.com/events/7131527-...-showcase. The service costs $29.99 per month. I plan to subscribe for KSU's three tournament games, then cancel.

UCLA is also 3-0, with wins against 1-2 Pepperdine, 0-2 Cal Northridge and 1-4 Virginia.

The Bruins are loaded with talent but have struggled with injuries. They had only seven players in uniform against Virginia. It's unclear how many will be available Friday.

Top UCLA scorer so far is junior guard Charisma Osborne, who has averaged 19.7 points per game. Imar'i Thomas, a 5-10 guard transfer from Cincinnati, averaged 21 points in the two games she has played.

If UCLA is still shorthanded, Kent State's depth could give it an advantage. Nine players average at least 12 minutes a game for the Flashes. KSU's leading scorer is sophomore guard Casey Santoro, who averaged 15 points a game. Forward Lindsey Thall (13.3), guard Katie 'Shumate (12.0) and forward Nila Blackford (10.5) also average in double figures.

The winner of Friday's game will play either Massachusetts (4-0) or South Dakota State (2-3 with losses to Mississippi State and Iowa State). In KSU's third game, it could play Charlotte (1-3 and the preseason favorite to win Conference USA), No. 14 Iowa State (4-0), Penn State (3-1) and St. Johns (3-1).

Wow. That’s how it’s done! 75-69 over #19 UCLA.

An amazing game and certainly one of the best wins in KSU women's basketball history. They beat No. 25 Texas A&M in their first NCAA tournament and No. 24 Virginia in 2000.

UCLA was ranked 19th in this week's AP poll.

There was nothing flukey about the win. KSU outscored UCLA 27-17 in the fourth quarter and 19-10 in the second. KSU trailed 61-60 with 3:07 left, then went on a 12-0 run over the next two minutes.

Coach Todd Starkey threw five different defenses -- all variations of things the Flashes had done before -- at UCLA. The Bruins shot only 36% from the floor and 35% from 3-point distance.

KSU shot 50% from there field and 53% on 3-pointers.

Lindsey Thall made 5-of-7 3-pointers and had 20 points and seven rebounds. Katie Shumate had 17 points and seven rebounds. Nila Blackford had 11 points and a season-high eight rebounds. Casey Santoro had 14 points and Hannah Young 10.

Kent is now 4-0 on the season.

The Flashes play 5-0 Massachusetts, which beat South Dakota State, at 5 p.m. Saturday in the Gulf Coast Showcase semifinals. The game is on FloHoops, which costs $29.99 a month. Link will be on the blog at http://wbbFlashes.com or at kentstatesports.com.

(11-26-2021 05:20 PM)cschierh Wrote:  An amazing game and certainly one of the best wins in KSU women's basketball history. They beat No. 25 Texas A&M in their first NCAA tournament and No. 24 Virginia in 2000.

UCLA was ranked 19th in this week's AP poll.

There was nothing flukey about the win. KSU outscored UCLA 27-17 in the fourth quarter and 19-10 in the second. KSU trailed 61-60 with 3:07 left, then went on a 12-0 run over the next two minutes.

Coach Todd Starkey threw five different defenses -- all variations of things the Flashes had done before -- at UCLA. The Bruins shot only 36% from the floor and 35% from 3-point distance.

KSU shot 50% from there field and 53% on 3-pointers.

Lindsey Thall made 5-of-7 3-pointers and had 20 points and seven rebounds. Katie Shumate had 17 points and seven rebounds. Nila Blackford had 11 points and a season-high eight rebounds. Casey Santoro had 14 points and Hannah Young 10.

Kent is now 4-0 on the season.

The Flashes play 5-0 Massachusetts, which beat South Dakota State, at 5 p.m. Saturday in the Gulf Coast Showcase semifinals. The game is on FloHoops, which costs $29.99 a month. Link will be on the blog at http://wbbFlashes.com or at kentstatesports.com.

Better than the Virginia win which was in Kent on January 24th. It was right in the middle of the ACC season and Virginia (including the coach) was annoyed to be even playing the game. Basically said so after the game. Called Kent a typical mid major team with only two good players (Zerman and Studer I believe). She wasn’t impressed. What I liked about this game was we took the lead, lost it and then came back. Impressive.

"Better than the Virginia win which was in Kent on January 24th. It was right in the middle of the ACC season and Virginia (including the coach) was annoyed to be even playing the game. Basically said so after the game. Called Kent a typical mid major team with only two good players (Zerman and Studer I believe). She wasn’t impressed. What I liked about this game was we took the lead, lost it and then came back. Impressive."

Major-majors are ALWAYS annoyed at having to play a mid-major at the mid-major's court. They think their lofty status puts them above such an indignity.

(11-26-2021 06:45 PM)Muskrat Wrote:  "Better than the Virginia win which was in Kent on January 24th. It was right in the middle of the ACC season and Virginia (including the coach) was annoyed to be even playing the game. Basically said so after the game. Called Kent a typical mid major team with only two good players (Zerman and Studer I believe). She wasn’t impressed. What I liked about this game was we took the lead, lost it and then came back. Impressive."

Major-majors are ALWAYS annoyed at having to play a mid-major at the mid-major's court. They think their lofty status puts them above such an indignity.

Especially once there conference season starts!!!

(11-26-2021 05:20 PM)cschierh Wrote:  The game is on FloHoops, which costs $29.99 a month. Link will be on the blog at http://wbbFlashes.com or at kentstatesports.com.

Absolute crime!!! I’ve heard numerous stories how bad their coverage is, how hard it is to get away from their billing and how they charge various prices for the same exact service. James Madison had a service they provided to their fans free of charge, but the CAA insisted on signing a deal with this bush league operation and charging these prices for it rather than looking for a bigger and better platform. At least 1/3 of their subscribers came from JMU, but their opinion meant nothing. Games on ESPN+ are less than 1/4 this price ($6.99/mo) and obviously a much more reputable operation. I will never give Flo a dime.

(11-27-2021 10:22 AM)burden Wrote:  

(11-26-2021 06:45 PM)Muskrat Wrote:  "Better than the Virginia win which was in Kent on January 24th. It was right in the middle of the ACC season and Virginia (including the coach) was annoyed to be even playing the game. Basically said so after the game. Called Kent a typical mid major team with only two good players (Zerman and Studer I believe). She wasn’t impressed. What I liked about this game was we took the lead, lost it and then came back. Impressive."

Major-majors are ALWAYS annoyed at having to play a mid-major at the mid-major's court. They think their lofty status puts them above such an indignity.

Especially once there conference season starts!!!

YUP!

UCLA falls again today to South Dakota St

Eight point lead at the half turned into a 72-64 loss. Didn’t see the game but when you shoot 25% on 2’s and only 31% overall it can’t help.

Flashes played a miserable second half. Everything they did well against UCLA went badly against Massachusetts, which is undefeated at 7-0.

Kent State is 4-1 and will play Penn State for third place in the Gulf Coast Showcase at 5 p.m. Sunday on FloHoops. Penn State lost to No. 13 Iowa State 93-59 Saturday.

KSU had only eight field goals and shot 23% from the field in the second half. Massachusetts played more physically, blocked nine shots (five in the last quarter) and outhustled KSU.

Kent State scored only one two-point basket in the second half and missed 16-of-23 layups in the game.

Lindsey Thall had 22 points, but no other Kent players scored more than eight. Five Flashes had scored in double figures against UCLA.

Thall has made 17 of her 30 three-points attempts (56.7%) so far this season. She also had nine rebounds Sunday.

Game story is on the blog at http://wbbFlashes.com.