HOWELL, N.J. – The sixth-ranked Fairleigh Dickinson women's bowling team went 1-1 in championship bracket play on Friday at the 2017 Northeast Conference Championships.
 
The Knights beat No. 25 St. Francis Brooklyn 4-3 in the opening round to move on and play No. 11 and top seed Sacred Heart, who clipped the Knights in seven games.

The loss to the Pioneers moves the Knights into the losers bracket where they will play St. Francis Brooklyn again tomorrow (Sunday) morning at 10:25 a.m. in an elimination game. The winner of that match will face Sacred Heart and would need to beat the Pioneers twice to win the NEC title. The championship match starts at 12:10 p.m. tomorrow afternoon.

Head coach Mike LoPresti said afterward, "That was [Sacred Heart] wheelhouse pattern. It is right in their comfort zone. We did a good job of taking them to seven games. It may look like we had a 3-1 lead but the lanes broke down in their favor."

"We made a couple of mental and physical errors, but you have to tip your hat to them. We have to regain our momentum for this morning tomorrow and do it again against St. Francis Brooklyn, who had beaten us three straight before today."

Against the Terriers to start play on Friday, the Knights found themselves down early after dropping the first two games (235-188 and 228-192). Fairleigh Dickinson quickly tied the match at two games apiece with a 212-145 win in game three and 235-188 in game four. St. Francis Brooklyn aided the Knights with open frames in both games to allow the Knights to pull out leads.

St. Francis Brooklyn took a 3-2 lead after a 200-182 win in game five. The Knights led early but two open frames allowed the Terriers to get back in and they capitalized to keep Fairleigh Dickinson at bay down the stretch.

The Knights found their grove in games six and seven. The Knights tallied their highest score of the afternoon in game six (254-167) after opening with four strikes and a spare. Fairleigh Dickinson then left little doubt in game seven with a 247-172 win. The Knights were up 42 pins after five frames in game seven and converted 15 strikes over the final two games of the match.

In the winner's bracket match versus Sacred Heart, the Knights got a come-from-behind win in game one, 178-166. The Knights closed with three strikes and an eight from Karsyn Lukosius and Melanie Hannon to get the win.

After Sacred Heart had held on to win game two – 202-197, the Knights reeled off two straight wins to take a 3-1 lead. In game three, the teams were close early but another strong close from Lukosius and Hannon – three strikes in the 10th – got the win (212-191). Game four saw the Knights open with marks in the first six frames, capped by Hannon – fifth – and Brown in the sixth. The score was nearly identical to game three (212-190) as well as how the Knights closed – strikes from Lukosius and Hannon.

However, Sacred Heart started perfect in game five and left no doubt to cruise to a 268-182 win. The Pioneers had nine strikes in the game. Open frames early for Fairleigh Dickinson allowed Sacred Heart to get out to a lead and get a 211-189 win to force a game seven. In game seven, the Knights started with back-to-back spares, but then Sacred Heart strung a few strikes together. Combined that with the Knights not striking, allowed the Pioneers to pull away for the 194-160 win.
 
LoPresti added, "I still like our chances. I love this team. They fight and claw but we have to tweak some things and throw more strikes tomorrow."