Box Score

ANNVILLE, Pa. – Elizabethtown held Lebanon Valley to three field goals in the final 10:27 and the Blue Jays came away with a 69-57 Commonwealth Conference victory Tuesday evening in Lynch Gymnasium.

The loss was the fourth in a row and the fifth in the last six games for Lebanon Valley (6-9, 1-4 CC). Etown (9-6, 3-2 CC) won its second straight game.

Senior forward Chad Heller of Etown and sophomore guard J.D. Byers (Westminster, Md./Westminster) of LVC shared game-high scoring honors with 14 points apiece. Senior guard Brian Loftus notched 12 points for the Blue Jays while senior center Jon English added 10 points.

Sophomore guard Evan Harlor (Danville, Pa./Danville) registered 11 points for the Flying Dutchmen and junior guard Jay Leader (Halifax, Pa./Halifax) contributed 10 points. Senior center Darren Pugh (Shippensburg, Pa./Shippensburg) led all players with 15 rebounds and needs just 30 boards to pass Andy Panko ’99 as Lebanon Valley’s career rebounding leader. He is also just 71 points shy of becoming LVC’s 26th 1,000-point scorer.

Freshman forward Dave Kasyan (Toms River, N.J./Toms River East) tied a career-high with four blocked shots for LVC.

Lebanon Valley out-rebounded Etown 44-35 but committed a season-high 28 turnovers. The Blue Jays came up with 19 steals.

Etown shot 80% (12-for-15) from the foul line and made its last eight free throws over the final 2:08.

A Leader three-pointer with 10:27 left in the game made it 44-42 in favor of Etown before the Valley went cold. Elizabethtown would hold LVC scoreless over the next 5:28 while putting together a 9-0 run to build an 11-point lead (53-42) with 5:56 left. Lebanon Valley scored its next six points on free throws and didn’t hit another field goal until Harlor knocked down a three with 1:54 to go. But with the Blue Jays making all of their free throws down the stretch, LVC was unable to draw closer than eight the rest of the way.

Lebanon Valley started the game strong and built a 19-10 lead following three foul shots from Leader with 10:16 to go in the opening half. But Etown came back with an 11-0 run and a free throw by junior forward Ian Daecher game the Jays their first lead (21-20) of the game with 5:51 to go in the first half.

Loftus hit a three-pointer with 4:07 left in the opening stanza to give Etown its biggest lead of the half (27-22) before LVC closed the period with a 5-0 surge to tie the game (27-27) at the break.

A three-pointer by Harlor and a lay-up from Pugh in the opening two minutes of the second half continued the Valley’s run and put LVC on top by five (32-27) with 18:21 showing on the clock. After five lead changes and one tie over a 3:05 stretch, Etown took the lead (40-39) for good when English dropped in a lay-up with 13:45 left.

Lebanon Valley returns to action on Thursday when it hosts Haverford College in a non-conference tilt starting at 7:30 p.m

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