Air Force Falcons Fall to Boise State, Drop Second Straight Conference Game

The Air Force Falcons women’s basketball team has seen its hot start to the season smothered to start Mountain West action.

Nov 20, 2013; Colorado Springs, CO, USA; A general view of the Air Force Falcons logo at Clune Arena before the start of the game against the Colorado Christian Cougars. / Isaiah Downing-Imagn Images

The Air Force Falcons women’s basketball team found themselves down from the start and unable to catch up in a 66-55 loss to Boise State on Wednesday in Boise, Idaho.

Coming off a six-point loss to New Mexico last weekend, the Falcons (10-4, 0-2 in Mountain West) was trying to get a bounce-back win over the Broncos (11-4, 1-1).

Instead, the Broncos led from the start, though they were unable to truly pull away from the Falcons until the fourth quarter.

Air Force stayed in the game even though it shot 27% from the field, while Boise State shot 48%. The Falcons stayed in the game a variety of ways, most notably forcing Boise State into 25 turnovers while they only committed nine. Air Force scored 20 points off those turnovers.

That helped offset the shooting percentage difference, along with Boise State’s tremendous 46-27 edge on the glass.

Boise State held a 17-12 lead after the first quarter, but only took a 32-28 lead into the locker room. The Broncos added a point to that lead after three quarters, before they outscored the Falcons 16-10 in the final 10 minutes.

The margin of victory was Boise State’s largest lead in the game.

Air Force’s leading scorer for the season, Milhanie Perry, led the Falcons with 21 points, two rebounds and a steal. She scored nearly half of her points and the free-throw line, going 9-for-12. That was well above her 16.2-point averaging entering the contest.

Madison Smith, Air Force’s second-leading scorer, finished with 16 points, including three 3-pointers, along with four rebounds, three assists and a team-high six steals.

Tatum Thompson led Boise State with 14 points, as she made all six of her field goal attempts and both of her free-throw attempts. She also had three rebounds, three blocked shots and two steals.

Dani Bayes added 13 points, as she connected on a trio of 3-pointers, along with a team-high assists.

The losses to Boise State, and to New Mexico in the Mountain West opener last weekend, puts a damper on the Falcons’ near-unprecedented start to the season.

The Falcons started the season 10-2, which was the program’s first 10-win non-conference slate. At one point, Air Force was 9-1, with its only loss in an overtime game to Army West Point.

After reaching 10 wins, it was the program’s best 10-game start since the 1982-83 season.

The Falcons return home to take on Nevada on Saturday at noon mountain.