STRATFORD, N.J. – The 17th-ranked Fairleigh Dickinson women's bowling team defeated 10th-ranked Duquesne in the first day of the NEC Spring Meet, in a close 4-3 battle.
The Knights (46-33, 6-9 NEC) defeated the Dukes as their lone win in three Baker best four-of-seven matches on the day. FDU also faced St. Francis Brooklyn and no. 13 Sacred Heart, falling 4-3 to the Terriers and 4-1 to the Pioneers.
FDU totaled 3,471 pins in its three matches, averaging 182.68 pins per game across the 190 frames. The Knights, who entered the day in fourth place in the NEC standings, moved to fifth place ahead of Saint Francis U and St. Francis Brooklyn. The Knights need to remain in fifth place after tomorrow's three matches in order to earn berth into the NEC Championships in March.
"It wasn't our best performance," said head coach
Mike LoPresti. "But we still managed to finish the day on a strong note. We'll need to continue that type of play tomorrow in order to qualify for the conference tournament."
Junior
Jenna Henderson and freshman
Cameron Spring started in all three matches for FDU, with senior
Samantha Hart and junior
Amanda Chrzanowski each making two starts and coming off the bench for a third. Junior
Aimee Sherman also played in all three matches with one start, and junior
Deborah Epps started the first two matches played.
Against St. Francis Brooklyn, the Knights gained the upper hand early with a 213-211 victory in game one, but the Terriers tied the score with a 200-162 win in game two. The match continued to go back and forth with FDU winning games three (192-159) and five (200-181) while the Terriers took games four (200-198) and six (180-168). The match then went down to the wire in the seventh game, but the Terriers snuck out the win with a late push, 185-181, to clinch a 4-3 victory.
The Knights then got off to a slow start against Sacred Heart, dropping the first two games before taking the third game 160-148. The Pioneers, however, bounced back with two more wins in the following stanzas to clinch a 4-1 win, dropping FDU to 0-2 for the day.
FDU then earned a key victory against the top-ranked team entering the day in no. 10 Duquesne. After the Dukes captured the first game, 226-187, the Knights then scored over 200 pins in each of the next two games to win 201-153 and 246-140 and take a 2-1 lead. FDU expanded its lead with a 197-161 win in game four, but the Dukes battled back with victories in the next two games to force a decisive game seven. The Knights withstood the charge and powered their way to a 184-146 game seven win to earn a 4-3 match victory.
The Knights play in their final three NEC regular season matches against no. 14 Mount St. Mary's, no. 25 LIU and Saint Francis U on Sunday beginning at 9 a.m.
