DOYLESTOWN (PA) – In the final home game of the regular season, Delaware Valley College celebrated its six seniors with a pre-game ceremony and then posted a 63-56 victory over King's College to notch its second consecutive berth to the Freedom Conference tournament.
After all of tonight's action, the tournament field has been set with four teams, and the seeds will be determined after Saturday's regular-season finales. The Aggies, who improved to 13-11 overall and 8-5 in league play will travel to defending champion FDU-Florham, which is tied with Eastern University atop the conference standings. Delaware Valley is tied with DeSales for third place and the Bulldogs will host Wilkes University on Saturday.
Delaware Valley started slow in the first half as it failed to hit a field goal for the first 7:44 before Eireann Anastasi connected on a layup. That basket sparked a 17-4 run that saw the Aggies open up their largest lead of the stanza at 22-15 with 6:36 left on the clock. Five different players scored during that stretch and senior Agatha Drozd came up with two big steals.
Jennifer Fabian countered for the Monarchs with a layup and, after a Shannon Barlow jumper on the other end, Fabian connected from beyond the arc to make it a four point contest, 24-20. Anastasi hit two from the charity stripe, but Kasey Seitz made her third 3-pointer of the half to cut the deficit to three with a minute and a half to play in the stanza. Delaware Valley responded with a huge three from Kelsey Kilpatrick before then end of the half to make it a 29-23 game at the break.
King's (10-14, 6-7 Freedom) opened the second half with a 3-pointer from Kayla Feairheller, but then they went cold and the Aggies capitalized with 10 unanswered points from the duo of Anastasi and Shannon Barlow who accounted for six and four point ,respectively. That gave Delaware Valley its largest lead of the night, 39-26 with just over 16 minutes to play in regulation.
The lead was short lived as the Monarchs came down the court and got a trey from Seitz that sparked a 9-0 run over the next 3:20 to cut the Aggie lead to four. The two squads traded treys before Marissa Manning hit a layup and then Seitz was fouled while shooting a three and did not miss from the line as King's regained the lead at 43-42 with just over 11 minutes to play. After Delaware Valley got another steal from Drozd that led to an easy layup for Brenna Coll, Seitz drained another trey to keep the Monarchs ahead by two.
From there, Kilpatrick got hot and hit three straight from beyond the arc to spark a 15-2 Aggie run that propelled them back into control as they held a 59-48 lead with just 4:12 left in the game. Delaware Valley was able to hold off any kind of late charge from King's for its third straight victory and a berth in the 2015 Freedom Conference tournament.
While it was Senior Night, it was the juniors in Anastasi and Kilpatrick that led the charge with a combined 38 points on the night. Kilpatrick was 5-for-5 from beyond the arc for 15 points while Anastasi led all scorers with 23 points and five assists. Barlow, a senior, contributed 11 points and seven boards while classmate Brittany Wood recorded a game and career-high 13 rebounds to go with five assists. Coll, a senior, had nine points and six rebounds while fellow Kacy Peyton earned the first start of her career and saw seven minutes of action. The sixth senior, Katelyn Donohue, has served as a student assistant coach all season.
Seitz was 5-for-9 from 3-point land and finished with 18 points and five assists for King's. Fabian added 17 points and eight rebounds in the loss.