BRYN MAWR, PA -- Center Amy Abernathy (Sr., Far Hills, NJ/American School-Paris) moved into second place in Franklin & Marshall College history in blocked shots as she tallied five to accompany 16 points and 16 rebounds as the women's basketball team survived an early scare from Bryn Mawr College for a 60-37 win in Centennial Conference action.
Abernathy, who became the third women's player in school history with 1,000 points and 1,000 rebounds in a career, swatted five shots to raise her career blocked shot total to 218 to surpass Tina Breithaupt '94 (216) for second place in school history in the statistic. Overall, Anne Krumrine '90 holds the school record with 309 blocked shots.
For her career, Abernathy now has 1,309 points and 1,026 rebounds as she also surpassed Breithaupt (1,293) for sixth in scoring in F&M history and moved within 155 boards of eclipsing Krumrine (1,180) for the school record in rebounds.
Against Bryn Mawr, she dominated the second half tallying 10 points and ripping down 10 rebounds, including seven defensive boards, in the second half as Franklin & Marshall (8-7, 8-3 CC) pulled away from a 22-21 halftime lead to outscore the Owls 38-16 in the second half for the 23 point victory.
Trailing early in the game, the Diplomats' offense sparked to hold a one point lead at intermission thanks to Abernathy who scored six points, reeled in six rebounds and blocked four shots in the opening frame to keep her team in the game. Overall, the key to the first half was turnovers as Bryn Mawr committed 14 miscues with eight F&M steals, while the Diplomats turned the ball over 13 times with four Bryn Mawr steals.
In addition, F&M struggled from the field hitting only 10-of-27 field goal attempts (37%) from the field, including 0-for-4 from beyond the arc, and two-of-two at the charity stripe. For Bryn Mawr, Amy Johnson hits three-of-eight from the field and two free-throws for nine first half points to lead an Owls' team which converted nine-of-27 field goal tries (33.3%) and one-of-three "threes".
In the second half, guard Courtney Courtney Tierney (Sr., Princeton, NJ/Hun School) led the team back connecting on four-of-six field goal attempts, including two-of-two on three-pointers, for 11 of her game high 19 points. Abernathy added a four-of-eight performance from the floor in the second half with a pair of free-throws for 10 points in the final half as F&M converted 15-of-29 field goal attempts (51.7%), two-of-six three point attempts (33.3%) and six-of-10 free-throws (60%) in the second half to take the victory.
For Bryn Mawr, Johnson finished with 19 points on six-of-20 shooting from the floor and six-of-six at the free-throw line, while JoAnn Gage chipped in 10 points as the Owls fall to 2-14 on the year, 0-11 in Centennial Conference play.
F&M will continue the season on February 3 at home versus Johns Hopkins University. Game time is set for 7:00 p.m.
