Box Score
ELIZABETHTOWN, Pa. – Lebanon Valley outscored Elizabethtown College 17-2 over the game’s opening 7:48, and the Dutchmen held off a second-half Blue Jay rally en route to a 63-56 victory in Commonwealth Conference women’s basketball action Saturday afternoon at Thompson Gymnasium.
It was the first road win of the season for Lebanon Valley (7-13, 4-6 CC), who had lost its previous eight contests away from the LVC Gymnasium.
With its win, LVC pulled into a three-way tie with Susquehanna and Juniata for fourth place in the Commonwealth standings. Susquehanna fell to Moravian on Saturday while Juniata defeated Widener.
Senior forward Monica Johnson led LVC with a season-high 25 points to go with 13 rebounds, good for her ninth double-double of the year. She scored the team’s final 10 points of the game, including a pair of critical free throws in the final minute. Sophomore forward Megan Bish added a season-high 21 points off the bench.
Megan Quinn made 5-of-8 3-pointers to lead Elizabethtown (10-9, 3-7 CC) with 19 points while Erin Walton scored 10 points, well under her 21.2 Commonwealth-Conference leading average. Audrey Hitz pulled down 13 rebounds for the Blue Jays.
Lebanon Valley led by 10 (32-22) at halftime, but E-town scored the first 10 points of the second stanza, capped by Quinn’s final trey of the afternoon, to tie the game for the first time since the opening tap. The Blue Jays would tie it two more times, the last coming on a 3-pointer from Courtney Kofeldt that made it 41-41 with 9:58 left.
E-town trailed by only a bucket (47-45) with 7:49 to go after a pair of Walton free throws, but that’s when Bish and Johnson keyed a 10-2 run to push LVC’s lead back into double digits (57-47) with 3:25 to go. Bish got things started with her second conventional 3-point play of the game, then followed up with a 3-ball from the left corner. Johnson capped the spurt with a put-back and a lay-up in transition.
The Blue Jays made it a one-possession game in the final minute following a 9-2 run. Hitz dropped in a lay-up following a steal in the backcourt to make it 57-53 with 1:43 left, and after a Johnson jumper, Quinn converted a driving lay-up and ensuing free throw to make it 59-56 with 37 ticks showing. E-town got the ball back after LVC was whistled for a five-second violation under its own basket after a timeout, but the Jays were unable to capitalize, as Quinn missed a jumper in the lane and Johnson rebounded before drawing a foul. She calmly sunk both free throws with 28 seconds left, then added two more foul shots with two seconds remaining after another E-town miss.
Lebanon Valley shot 41.8% for the game while holding E-town to 37.3% shooting. However, the Jays made 50.0% (8-of-19) of their 3-point attempts.
LVC held the Jays scoreless over the game’s opening six-and-a-half minutes, building a 12-0 lead. Hitz finally put E-town on the scoreboard with a lay-up at the 13:26 mark.
Bish scored eight straight points for the Valley after coming off the bench, and her conventional 3-point play made it 17-2 with 12:12 on the clock.
Elizabethtown climbed back into it midway through the half, thanks in large part to a trio of 3-pointers from Quinn. Her final trey of the period made it 23-15 with 5:12 remaining, but LVC scored the next seven points, capped by a Johnson lay-up, to push its lead back to 15 (30-15) with 2:58 on the clock. A driving lay-up from junior guard Donna Geiger with 18 ticks showing gave the Valley its 10-point halftime advantage.
Lebanon Valley picks up its schedule on Wednesday, when it hosts Moravian College at 6 p.m. in another Commonwealth Conference tilt.
[Photo - Senior forward Monica Johnson, who had 25 points and 13 rebounds in Lebanon Valley's 63-56 win at Elizabethtown on Saturday]
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