The Lancaster Bible women's basketball team pulled away late and defeated Bryn Athyn, 73-64 for its 12th straight victory on Tuesday night at Horst Athletic Center. The victory, Lancaster Bible's 12th in a row, improves the Chargers to 17-3 overall and 14-1 in North Eastern Athletic Conference play.
Tuesday's game was a back-and-forth affair for 40 minutes as Bryn Athyn used timely shooting to keep pace with the Chargers. Neither team had a lead larger than six points in the first half as both teams shot the ball over their season average. Not only was Bryn Athyn able to score, but they put several Lancaster Bible players into early foul trouble, including junior Aubrey Folger.
Folger had 12 points and nine rebounds in the first half, but picked up her third foul with 1:49 to play in the opening 20 minutes. Lancaster Bible Head Coach Rachel Steinbarger never wavered and let Folger stay in the game and Folger ended up playing all 40 minutes and finished with...three fouls.
The Chargers led 36-34 at the half, but the Lions scored on their first two possessions of the second half and took a quick three-point lead at 39-36 that was erased by back-to-back 3-pointers from Kirsten Webster who gave Lancaster Bible a 42-39 lead with 18:02 to play. Bryn Athyn answered right back with a 6-2 over the next four minutes to take a 45-44 lead with 14:07 left.
Once again, Lancaster Bible's outside shooting propelled the Chargers back into the lead as juniors Christy Lorah and Katy Stover hit back-to-back triples to give the Chargers a 50-45 edge with 12:14 remaining. After a Bryn Athyn basket, another jumper from Lorah, who finished with 11 points, and a 3-pointer from Stover gave Lancaster Bible its biggest lead of the game up to that point at 55-47 with 8:59 to play.
The theme of the game reared its head again though as the Lions trimmed the deficit to one at 57-56 just three minutes later and the game was back to being a nail biter. Lancaster Bible's advantage stayed at one or three over the next three minutes as Shanice Smith and Folger continued to be forces inside for the Chargers.
After a Kristina Clark layup cut the Chargers' lead to one again at 63-62 with 2:55 to play, Lancaster Bible scored on its next possession and finally got the defensive stop that seemed to elude the Chargers all night long. Clark missed a 3-pointer that would have tied the game and Folger's layup gave the Chargers some breathing room at 67-62 with 1:45 remaining. The Lions would only score one more bucket, but the game was out of reach by then and Lancaster Bible had survived to win its 12th straight game.
Lancaster Bible controlled the glass all night long as they held a 49-24 rebounding advantage. The Chargers had 20 offensive rebounds to the Lions' five and Folger and Smith combined for 17 of the 20 offensive boards. Smith had 22 rebounds total, the second time this season she has had 20 or more rebounds in a game, while Folger finished with 13 boards.
Folger led all scorers with 22 points as she was 9-of-18 from the floor and a perfect 4-of-4 from the free throw line. In addition to her 22 rebounds, Smith had 14 points, five assists and three steals. Katy Stover was the fourth Lancaster Bible player in double figure as she scored 18 points and had four of Lancaster Bible's seven 3-pointers.
For all of the offense production, it was Lancaster Bible's defensive stops at the end that Steinbarger pointed to after the game.
"I thought we struggled a lot of the game getting stops, but when we needed them at the end, we got them," Steinbarger said. "We need to have more pride on defense and sometimes tonight we just seemed disinterested in playing defense."
Steinbarger thought Smith and Folger played well, especially with the early foul trouble.
"We are lucky to have Shanice on this team," Steinbarger said. "She brings so many things to the table. From grabbing a big rebound to just hustling on every play, she just has a presence about her. And for Aubrey to play with three fouls for the whole second half, I thought she did a great job defensively and was once again a force on the offensive side of the floor."
Webster had a terrific all-around game as well as she had eight points, seven assists and five rebounds.
The Chargers will have two days of practice to get ready for the biggest game of their season thus far. Lancaster Bible travels to Utica, N.Y. on Friday for a matchup with the NEAC North Division leader SUNY Polytechnic. Should these two teams remain atop their respective divisions, Friday's game will determine who the host of the NEAC Final Four will be at the end of the month, something that is not lost on any of the Chargers.
"We all know what this game means on Friday," Steinbarger said. "Both teams obviously want to win and have the inside track to hosting and we are going to have to play some of our best basketball if we are going to go up there and win."
Lancaster Bible will still need to win the NEAC South Division to be the host of the NEAC Final Four should it win on Friday, but the Chargers currently hold a 2 1/2 game lead with five games to play over Penn St. Abington and appear to be headed towards their third straight NEAC South Division Championship.
Friday's game is slated to tip-off at 5 p.m.
Notes:
-Lancaster Bible won both meetings with Bryn Athyn this season as the Chargers won, 58-42 at Bryn Athyn on December 6.
-Stover's 18 points give her 926 for her career as she continues her march toward 1,000 points.
-Folger now has 1,359 points in her illustrious career and she is just 24 points from passing Jill London (1983-87) for second place on the Chargers' all-time scoring list.