SCRANTON, Pa. – The top-seeded University of Scranton women's basketball team (27-0) used a big third quarter to pull away from the No. 2 seed Elizabethtown Blue Jays (22-4) en route to capturing the program's eighth straight Landmark title with a 69-54 victory on Saturday afternoon at the John Long Center in Scranton.

Scranton led 37-32 at halftime before outscoring the Blue Jays by a 16-8 margin in the third quarter and rolled to the 69-54 win. With the victory, the Lady Royals have secured the Landmark's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament and the field of 64 will be announced in a live selection show on NCAA.com on Monday afternoon at 2:30 p.m.

Freshman Kaci Kranson (Scranton, Pa./Holy Cross) put together a dominant effort on Saturday to earn MVP honors as she led the team with 19 points, 12 rebounds and five assists.

ETown scored the first seven points of the game and led 11-3 before Kranson hit a layup to spark a 13-5 run that carried into the second quarter. Senior Bridget Monaghan (Florham Park, N.J./Morristown-Beard) put an exclamation point on the run with a three to tie the game at 16 apiece with 9:14 left in the second quarter. Monaghan buried another three to break a 24-all tie later in the quarter and junior Maddie Hartnett (Chatham, N.J./Chatham) hit a three of her own with just over a minute left to help give the Lady Royals a 37-32 edge at the half.

Scranton led 39-33 in the early stages of the third quarter when Hartnett buried her second of three threes on the day which ignited an 11-2 run and a Kranson layup stretched the lead to 50-35 with 4:22 to go in the period. The Lady Royals led 53-40 after three and the Blue Jays cut the lead to 11 at 56-45 early in the fourth before senior Sara Walsh (Havertown, Pa./Haverford) responded for the hosts with a jumper and graduate student Sam Rajza (Plains, Pa./Holy Redeemer) sank consecutive threes for a 66-45 advantage with 4:30 remaining. Senior Hannah Angelini (Baldwin Place, N.Y./Somers) then buried a three of her own for the largest lead of the day at 69-47 and the celebration was on down the stretch for the Lady Royals.

Joining Kranson in double figures was Monaghan with 14 points and Hartnett with 11 points on 4-of-6 shooting (3-of-4 3PT). Angelini added nine points and five boards for Scranton, while Walsh added a season-high eight points.

Summer McNulty led the Blue Jays with 20 points in the setback, but was held to just 3-of-11 shooting in the second half.

For the game, Scranton shot 39.1% (25-of-64) from the field, 45.8% (11-of-24) from three and 80.0% (8-of-10) from the free throw line. ETown was 20-of-55 (36.4%) from the floor, 5-of-17 (29.4%) from long range and 81.8% (9-of-11) from the charity stripe.

In fact, head coach Ben O'Brien's team held the Blue Jays to just 21.4% shooting (6-of-28) in the second half.

Stay tuned to athletics.scranton.edu on Monday afternoon for more info on the Lady Royals' NCAA First Round opponent.

--LADY ROYALS--