LAUREL, Md. -- The Fairleigh Dickinson women's bowling team continued its domination on Sunday, Jan. 19 at the 14-team "Fred Underwood" Lady Bulldogs Classic, hosted by Bowie State, by claiming the tournament title. The Knights defeated Adelphi and St. Francis Brooklyn, both Northeast Conference foes, for the championship.

FDU also faced Chowan in an out-bracket match, before facing the Terriers. The Knights finished the tournament 13-0 to improve to 44-11 on the season and have constructed a 17-game win streak.

FDU was the No. 1 seed in Sunday's championship bracket, which consisted of best-of-seven baker matches. The bracket was a triple-round bracket, which meant the Knights would play No. 2 seed Adelphi in the first round. A win would give FDU a bye to the championship; a loss would drop the Knights to the loser's bracket.

But FDU did not have to play in the loser's bracket after squeaking past Adelphi, 4-3. The Knights dropped the first game (203-171) but bounced back with a pair of victories (258-202, 183-168) to take a 2-1 lead. Adelphi then nipped FDU, 177-173, to tie the match at 2-2, but the Knights would come back and win a pivotal game five, 243-166.

With its back to the wall, Adelphi tied the match at 3-3, with a 237-216 victory, but FDU would advance to the championship by winning a close seventh game, 226-214.

The Knights used the lineup of freshman Morgan Brown (West Deptford, N.J./West Deptford), sophomore Nicolette Sarin (Sewell, N.J./Washington Township High School), senior Michelle Hunzaker (Cary, NC/Green Hope High School), freshman Melanie Hannon (Cheektowaga, N.Y./Maryvale) and junior Liat Vizenfeld (Holon, Israel/Campus Kiryat Sharet) in the match with Adelphi.

Before playing the championship match, FDU faced the No. 14 seed, Chowan in an out-bracket match. The Knights, who used a lineup of freshman Lexus Lopez (Lyndhurst, N.J./Lyndhurst), freshman Sydney Scelfo (Brick, N.J./Brick Township), sophomore Rebecca Fischer (Pittsburgh, Pa./Northgate High School), sophomore Natasha Ashby (Philadelphia, Pa./Science Leadership Academy) and Hunzaker, cruised to an easy 4-0 victory over the last seed.

The championship match pitted FDU against conference-rival St. Francis Brooklyn, who defeated Adelphi and was also 12-0 going into the final contest. But the Knights would defeat the Terriers, 4-2, for the championship, using the same lineup from the Adelphi match.

FDU won the first two matches (206-181, 226-190), but St. Francis rallied to knot the match at 2-2 (205-182, 245-234). In the end, the Knights would close out the Terriers with the final two victories (266-180, 201-169).

In the pivotal fifth game FDU bowled a strike in the first nine frames before Vizenfeld left a split in the 10th. Brown threw five strikes out of her last six and seven out of 12 overall. Sarin bowled nine of 12 strikes, and Hannon added eight of 12 strikes in the match. All three only left one open frame.

Vizenfeld, Hannon and Sarin were named to the All-Tournament Team. All three finished 1-2-3 in total pinfall, the first time in team history for this accomplishment. Vizenfeld finished with 1090, Hannon with 1083 and Sarin with 1058.

"It was a great, great weekend, and it is not often that all of our pretournament goals are met," Head Coach Mike LoPresti said. "It was an exciting weekend because it starts off our second half on a very strong point, and we were able to improve our play as the weekend moved along."

"Our biggest nightmare is the big winter break we had," LoPresti said. "Coming back after that break, we have no idea how we are going to play, but expectations are high. This tournament was able to get us close to being back to the level of play where we were at during the fall."

FDU will return to action Jan. 24-26 when it travels to Reading, Pa. to participate in the Kutztown Golden Bear Invitational.