Army Topples Lehigh 70-52 in Saturday Afternoon Tilt

Saturday, February 25

West Point, N.Y.

3 p.m.

Lehigh University

9-19 (4-13PL)

Army West Point

21-7 (12-5PL)

LEHIGH

ARMY

Army Topples Lehigh 70-52 in Saturday Afternoon Tilt

2/25/2017 6:50:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score

WEST POINT, N.Y. – The Lehigh women's basketball team shot 43.5 percent (20-for-46) on Saturday, its best percentage on the road this season, but Army used a strong day on the glass to pull away from the Mountain Hawks 70-52. Freshman Gena Grundhoffer had team-highs of 12 points and five rebounds, junior Quinci Mann scored 10 points on 4-of-8 shooting, and freshman Camryn Buhr tallied seven points. Sophomore Bryce Menendez tied her career-high with six points and Meagan Eripret had four rebounds and two blocks. Army was led by Madison Hovren who had 20 points and 14 rebounds, and Aliyah Murray with 16 points and seven rebounds to help Army shoot 35.1 percent (26-for-74) overall. The Black Knights made the biggest difference of the game in the rebounding department, holding a 47-30 edge, including 26 on the offensive end. The Cadets also committed eight turnovers to Lehigh's 20, and held a 20-4 edge in second chance points and an 18-4 edge in points off turnovers. The win moves Army to 21-7, 12-5 PL on the season, while Lehigh falls to 9-19, 4-13 PL.

"I thought we did a good job in our half-court defense, but you know going into game like this that 35 percent of their offense is from offensive rebounds and points off turnovers," said head coach Sue Troyan. "If you don't take care of the ball and you don't defensive rebound, you're not going to have a chance to win, and we didn't do either one of those."

Lehigh held the lead for most of the first quarter, jumping out to a quick 4-0 lead courtesy of buckets from Grundhoffer and Mann. Grundhoffer made it 6-3 with a layup, and then added two free throws after an Army basket to make it 8-5 coming out of the media timeout. Army tied the game with a trio of free throws before Bernadette Devaney gave Lehigh a 10-8 lead with a layup in the closing seconds. Lehigh opened the game 4-for-9 overall from the field through the first 10 minutes, while Army struggled by starting just 2-for-13.

Menendez opened the second quarter with a jumper to up the Lehigh lead to four points, before Diazjah Morris hit a three-pointer and Hovren sank two free throws to give Army its first lead of the ballgame. The lead changed hands twice as Mann and Murray traded two buckets apiece on four straight trips down the court, before Murray answered once again with a layup to give the Cadets a 19-16 lead with 5:38 remaining until halftime.

After Lehigh knotted the game at 19 on a Mann three-pointer, Army closed the period on a 15-6 run, including a 9-1 stretch to take a 30-21 lead, prompting a Lehigh timeout with 2:37 remaining. Menendez and Hovren traded layups following the timeout, and Buhr added a layup with just under a minute to go to cut it to 32-25. Army responded with a layup with 32 seconds left to take a nine-point lead, and then had a chance to extend the lead before halftime following a Lehigh turnover, but the final shot fell short.

Lehigh (56.2 percent) outshot Army (36.1 percent) in the opening half, but Army held a 20-15 edge on the glass and an 11-2 advantage in second chance points. Lehigh committed 12 turnovers to Army's five.

"We tried to get them to score in the half-court and I thought we did a good job there, but we did a terrible job with taking care of the basketball and defensive rebounding," Troyan said.

The Cadets moved the lead to double digits for the first time over the first four minutes of the third quarter thanks to six straight points from Murray to build a 40-29 lead. Cameryn Benz added a three-pointer and Hannah Hedstrom rolled in a layup with 3:49 remaining to get the deficit back to eight, but layups from Lena' Hicks and Hovren moved the lead back to 12 before Hailey Pascoe hit a free throw for the Mountain Hawks to make it an 11-point game at 48-37 heading to the fourth.

"They did a god job of getting the ball out of our hands early before we could set up our offense," Troyan said. "I thought that was a good adjustment on their end. They're athletic and execute well what they're trying to do."

The Mountain Hawks got as close as eight early in the fourth quarter after jumpers by Devaney and Grundhoffer. After back-to-back layups from Hovren, Buhr made two free throws to make it 55-43 with 6:29 remaining. Four straight points from Janae McNeal grew the lead to 16 for the first time and two free throws by Hovren increased the lead to 18 at 61-43 with 4:10 on the clock. Pascoe got Lehigh back to within 14 on her lone three-point attempt of the day with 3:27 to go, but that was as close as it would get as a Hedstrom layup and two free throws from Grundhoffer capped the Lehigh scoring over the final 2:26.

"I thought in a game where we were really struggling to rebound the ball, they both gave us good energy coming off the bench," Troyan said of Menendez and Eripret. "Bryce was aggressive on the offensive end and I thought Meg did a really nice job on the defensive end with rebounding the basketball."

Lehigh will close out the regular season on Wednesday night at Stabler Arena when they host Colgate. Tipoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. on the Patriot League Network and ESPN Radio 1160/1230/1320 AM.

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