Box Score SCRANTON, Pa. – The top-seeded University of Scranton women's basketball team (26-0) limited No. 4 seed Moravian (16-11) to just 19.3% shooting from the floor and remained unbeaten with a 58-31 victory over the Greyhounds in Landmark Conference semifinal action on Wednesday night at the John Long Center in Scranton.
With the win, the Lady Royals advance to their 10th consecutive Landmark Championship game and will host No. 2 seed Elizabethtown in Saturday's title game with opening tip on the John Long Center for 2 p.m.
The Blue Jays advanced to the finals with an 81-64 win over No. 3 seed Catholic in Wednesday's other semifinal.
Scranton put together a dominant first quarter and scored 12 of the final 14 points in the quarter to take a 16-4 lead after one. The Lady Royals led 19-6 in the early stages of the second quarter following a three by senior Bridget Monaghan (Florham Park, N.J./Morristown-Beard), but the Greyhounds began to fight back and cut the lead to eight at 21-13 with 3:36 left in the period. Graduate student Sam Rajza (Plains, Pa./Holy Redeemer) buried a three for Scranton with just under two minutes left in the quarter and junior Allie Lynch (Villanova, Pa./Academy of Notre Dame de Namur) hit a layup on the next possession to make it a 26-15 game at the break.
After freshman Kaci Kranson (Scranton, Pa./Holy Cross) made a layup to open the scoring in the third quarter, Moravian embarked on a 10-2 run that cut the lead to 30-25 at the 4:49 mark. Monaghan quickly responded with a layup of her own and this was where the Lady Royals took control of the game with 10 straight points and senior Hannah Angelini (Baldwin Place, N.Y./Somers) connected on a jumper for a 40-25 advantage. Holding a 40-26 lead after three, Monaghan made a jumper to begin the fourth and Rajza stretched the lead to 20 with a four-point play after a feed by Angelini with 9:28 remaining. Moravian was unable to get any closer than 20 points the rest of the way as Scranton held the visitors to just five total points in the quarter.
The 31 points allowed is a season-best for Scranton and marks the fewest allowed in a game since a 59-29 win at Juniata on Jan. 29, 2022.
Monaghan led the Lady Royals with a game-high 15 points and also added eight rebounds and five assists, while Angelini tallied 10 points, a team-high nine rebounds and five assists of her own.
Emily Markowski had 10 points to pace the Greyhounds in the setback as Scranton limited the team's top two scorers in Kayla Yoegel and Tessa Zamolyi to just eight points on 2-of-22 shooting.
Head coach Ben O'Brien's team shot 37.7% (23-of-61) from the field, 25.0% (8-of-32) from long range and 80.0% (4-of-5) from the free throw line, while limiting Moravian to the 19.3% (11-of-57) from the floor and 19.0% (4-of-21) from deep.
Scranton also forced 20 Greyhound turnovers on the night as Angelini, Lynch and Monaghan had two steals apiece.
A full preview of Saturday's title game will be posted on Friday at athletics.scranton.edu
--LADY ROYALS--
