HAMILTON, N.J. (March 19, 2021) – The Mount St. Mary's bowling team got an elimination match victory over Long Island before falling to the No. 1 seed Fairleigh Dickinson Knights Friday at the Northeast Conference Championships. The loss puts the Mount in the loser's bracket for an elimination match vs. the No. 3 seed Sacred Heart Pioneers.

Junior Rebecca Dodson was stellar in the traditional format, shooting a 269 and 234 for a 503 total. In the baker format, it was Junior Tamera Stanton leading the way with a 21.16 baker frame average. On the day, the Mount averaged 201.1.

Mount: 2 |Long Island: 0

Following the always grueling mega match format used in all NCAA postseason play, the Mount defeated LIU 1,079-828 in the traditional leg to go up 1-0. A 269 from Dodson and 224 from Stanton aided the victory. Moving into the quint baker format, the Mount fell behind by 97 pins after two games before tossing a final three games of 187, 227, and 218 to complete a comeback and end up with an eight pin victory.
It came down to the final frame, when a Dodson mark countered a LIU open in the tenth to secure the victory and avoid the best-of-seven tiebreaker.

Mount: 0 | Fairleigh Dickinson: 2

The Mountaineers kept up a solid scoring pace for their match with the No. 1 overall seed, but a more than impressive performance from the Knights was more than any team in the building could keep up with. The Knights used a 299 effort in the traditional format to go 1,091 and only got better in the quint baker format with a 1,098. A 234 from Dodson pushed the Mount to 994 for in traditional before a 987 quint baker total, but it would not be enough.

"Overall, we cannot complain about today," said head coach Kenneth DeGraaf. "We got the must win victory against LIU to stay alive and then we ran into one of the best single day team performances I have ever seen during my coaching tenure. We have to tip our hat off to FDU and come back tomorrow ready to keep our spirits high against an always solid Sacred Heart squad. We have taken this route before to get to the championship and I know we can do it again."

The opening match tomorrow morning with the Pioneers will be a rematch of the 2019 NEC Championship Finals, when the Mount nearly captured the conference crown with an all-freshmen squad. The elimination match will begin at 9:00 AM ET with the winner advancing to the semi-finals to take on the loser of FDU and Duquesne.