The Bulldogs man­han­dled Grand Valley for their first vic­tory of the sea­son at Wink Arena

The Ferris State men’s bas­ket­ball team earned their first win of the young sea­son in dom­i­nat­ing fash­ion on Monday night.

The Bulldogs ended their three-game los­ing skid as they won their home opener 67–41 over Grand Valley State. Ferris improved its record to 1–3 over­all and 1–0 in the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC). This was the first GLIAC con­test of the sea­son through­out the entire league.

Junior forward/center Justin Keenan paced a bal­anced offen­sive effort for the Bulldogs with 15 points and seven rebounds. Keenan was only 1–7 from the floor, but was 13–18 from the free throw line. Junior guard Darien Gay shot 5–8 from the field en route to 13 points and three assists. Ferris had eight play­ers score five or more points in the contest.

Grand Valley held an early lead at 9–8, but a three-pointer by Gay gave the Bulldogs an 11–9 lead at the 12:27 mark of the first half. From that point on, Ferris did not look back as it held the lead for the remain­der of the contest.

The Bulldog defense harassed the Lakers into 14 first half turnovers and 27.3% shoot­ing from the floor. Ferris was able to cap­i­tal­ize off those turnovers as they turned them into 15 first half points. Head coach Bill Sall was very pleased with his team’s defen­sive effort through­out the contest.

“We did a tremen­dous job of play­ing with energy and hus­tling to loose balls tonight,” said Sall.
Senior guard/forward Austin Randel nailed a three-pointer with five sec­onds left in the first half to give Ferris a 33–16 lead at halftime.

The sec­ond half was more of the same as the Bulldogs came out with the same inten­sity and were able to stretch their lead to a 27-point advan­tage. Every time the Lakers were able to make a play, the Bulldogs answered at the other end of the floor. As a team, Ferris shot 51.2% from the field for the game.

“Tonight our defense was def­i­nitely our best offense,” said Sall.

Ferris will next be hit­ting the hard­wood at home tomor­row against the Ashland Eagles. The Eagles are over­all 2–1 this sea­son and have not yet played a con­fer­ence game.

Offensively, the teams are evenly matched as Ferris scores 69.5 points per game and Ashland scores 71.3 points per game. Ferris has allowed four points per game less than Ashland so far this season.

Ferris fin­ished fifth in the GLIAC last sea­son with 12–10 record against con­fer­ence oppo­nents. Ashland went 8–14 against GLIAC teams and fin­ished 10^th in the con­fer­ence. The Bulldogs won both con­tests with the Eagles dur­ing the 2008–2009 sea­son and scored 196 points com­bined in the two victories.