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Kenyon College Athletics

Claudia Cooke
Sejin Kim
69
Winner Penn St.-Behrend PSUB 6-2,0-0 AMCC
66
Kenyon Kenyon 2-6,0-1 NCAC
Winner
Penn St.-Behrend PSUB
6-2,0-0 AMCC
69
Final
66
Kenyon Kenyon
2-6,0-1 NCAC
Score By Periods
Team 1 2 3 4 F
Penn St.-Behrend PSUB 14 24 13 18 69
Kenyon Kenyon 22 9 14 21 66

Game Recap: Women's Basketball |

Cooke controls boards, but Owls fall just short

GAMBIER, Ohio -- Kenyon College junior center Claudia Cooke racked up 22 rebounds, scored 15 points and helped the Owls women's basketball team through a second-half surge that erased a 12-point deficit. The visiting Lions of Penn State Behrend, however, steadied themselves late in the game and held on for a 69-66 non-conference win.

At the tail end of an evenly-played first half, Penn State Behrend scored the final eight points of the second quarter to take a 38-31 lead at the break. In the third quarter, the Lions' lead stretched out to a dozen points on three separate occasions.

Kenyon (2-6) then looked to Anissa Hardy to lead a surge that saw the Owls cut the deficit down to six points heading into the final quarter of play. In that brief run, Hardy scored four points on a layup and a couple of free throws.

Trailing 51-45, Kenyon got another bucket from Hardy to start play in the fourth. Katie Orefice followed with a field goal and Cooke hit one of two free throws to bring the Owls within one point. 

About 50 seconds later, Alyssa Gest buried a three-pointer that put Kenyon ahead 53-51. Cooke tacked on a close-range hoop and the Owls owned a 55-51 advantage with 5:10 left.

That four-point advantage held up for nearly two minutes, but at the 3:32 mark the Lions began a comeback of their own. Back-to-back three-pointers from Rachel Majewski and Morgan Altavilla put Penn State Behrend back in front, 62-60, with 2:47 remaining.

Those three-pointers ignited a 9-0 Lions run that all but decided the outcome.

Kenyon's Mikayla Rudolph, who finished with eight points, snapped a long distance three-pointer to bring the game within four points, but Penn State Behrend answered again and only a last-second bucket from Rudolph made it a three-point final.

In addition to Cooke's 15, the Owls got a dozen points from Hardy and 11 apiece from Orefice and Bela Krslovic. Hardy also had nine rebounds and, along with Cooke's 22, gave Kenyon a 52-42 margin in overall team rebounds.

Cooke's output on the boards was the third-best in program history. It was one rebound shy of the 23 Danielle Bartlett grabbed against Oberlin College in 1993 and three shy of the program record of 25 set by Mary Salmon against John Carroll University in 1984.

On the opposite side of the court, Altavilla led all scorers with 26 points. Majewski wasn't far behind, tallying 23 for Penn State Behrend (6-2).

Kenyon has one home game left in the calendar year and that will be Sunday, December 18 against Otterbein University. 
 
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