CMU women’s basketball coach Sue Guevara has said all season that the team must win its home games and steal at least one on the road.

After a pair of disappointing road losses at Akron and Buffalo last week, which the team shot less than 30 percent, CMU now finds itself in third place in the Mid-American Conference West Division at 5-5, behind Eastern Michigan (7-3) and Toledo (8-2).

CMU begins a four-game homestand — its most important stretch of the season — tonight against league leader Bowling Green at Rose Arena, before playing Northern Illinois, EMU and Toledo. All four of these are must-win games.

Tonight

But first things first — a fast start tonight against BGSU is imperative. CMU got off to slow starts against Akron and Buffalo and didn’t give itself much of a chance with its poor shooting performance.

And it’s going to take more than CMU’s “big three” of Britni Houghton, Kaihla Szunko and Shonda Long to beat Bowling Green.

The Falcons rely heavily on its guard play of Lauren Prochaska (18.3 points, 5.3 rebounds per game), Tracy Pontius (12.5 points, 3.2 assists) and Tamika Nurse (9.7 points, 3.2 assists) and will require strong play from Kendra Holman, Heidi Warczinsky and Jalisa Olive.

Holman and Warczinsky must bounce back from their zero-point performances against Buffalo and Olive needs to score more than two points, her average in the last six games.

Ramifications

A win against the Falcons would not only extend CMU’s Rose Arena winning streak to seven and put it over .500 in the MAC again.

It also would give the players confidence that they can beat the best in the conference and prove to the rest of the league that they are a legitimate contender for a MAC West title.

A loss would hand CMU its fourth defeat in the past five games and likely dash any hopes of a first-place run.

The team might not admit it, but this is the biggest game of the season.

Tonight will prove how resilient the team is. They are still in the title hunt, but they’re going to have to fight for it.

E-mail the author: Aaron McMann