Page 11 The Behrend Beacon Team hits rough stretch over break Capi has been leading the teai this season; helping her team get points and stopping the opposition Swim team heats phomore ristine by Lyndsey Boor staff writer While most of us were shoveling out our driveways from the winter bliz zards, the Behrend swim team w as en joying the warmth of the Florida sun. Both the men’s and women’s swim teams traveled l l f hours to compete against other college teams Irom the Florida area. “The swim meet was just a tun thing put together by the coaches and the aquatics director ol the pool we were at. Nothing too serious," commented in Florida II play an instrumental role in the success of this year’s team lams wil swim coach Josh Heynes. The trip wasn’t all vacation, though. The team practiced hard both in the pool and up and down the Florida coastline. Not only did the Lions have to adjust to a different weather climate, hut the pool they raced and practiced in was twice as big as the pool in the Junker Center. “It was a 50 meter pool so it made things very interesting in practices, since most of the team has never swam in a pool that size before,” said Heynes. It is difficult for most competitive swimmers to adjust to a larger pool SPOIi Friday, January 17, 2003 By Kevin Fiorenzo staff writer After a successful start to the sea son, the women’s basketball team is struggling to stay at .500 after a rough l -3 stretch over Christmas break. On Dec.l4, the Lions were 5-4 overall, 2-0 in conference. The team returned in January to start a stretch of tough non-conference games. Their first game back was at Case Western Reserve on Jan. 7. Behrend’s offense was ineffective for most of the night as the team failed to have anyone score over 10 points. On the other end of the spectrum, their defense was unable to stop Case Western’s explosive offense, which had four players scoring in double fig ures. The Behrend women were un able to get any rhythm going and ended up being routed 69-49. Coach Roz Fornari attributed the tough loss to inactivity. “Perhaps (it was) too much rust at this point from the break or injuries or just lack of focus." she said. The squad continued its road trip on Jan. 9 at Hiram College where they were able to turn their fortunes size, but the teams took it all in stride. The hard work over the break will hopefully prove helpful for the teams in the coming weeks. In only five weeks the Behrend swim teams will face off against Grove City and other teams at the three day conference meet that will be hosted by Grove City. It won’t be an easy five weeks though. The teams have a lot of double meets on Fridays and Saturdays throughout this month. Although the next couple of weeks will be tough, the swim teams are eager to prove them selves at conferences on Feb.2Bth. around. The Lions were led by for ward Amber Krumpe, who had 14 points and 9 rebounds. The game was tight most of the way but the women were able to eventually pull out the win by a score of 57-47. Next on the schedule, the team re turned home for a game against Thiel on Jan. 11. The Lions got production from Krumpe and Carly Cochran, who scored 15 and 12 points respec tively. but the rest of the team was in effective. Thiel capitalized on this and kept Behrend’s offense under wraps. In the end, the Lions suffered an em barrassing rout at the hands of Thiel by a score 73-51. After the game, the team's emotions reflected the score. “Team morale seems to be down after the last few games, so we need to find a way within ourselves to change that feel ing." said point guard F.rica Mozdy, who had six rebounds. Unfortunately, team morale would not be rising after the next game. The squad suffered another home defeat, this time at the hands of Washington and Jefferson on January 13 by a score of 70-50. Once again, the offense was stalling and the team defense, a per ceived strength, let the team down lions ready to pick Junior James Curren is only 49 points shy of g 1000 for his career here at Behrend. by Zoe Rose staff writer The new year started off on the right foot as the Penn State Behrend men’s basketball team carried it’s way with three straight wins to a 8-4 overall mark on the season. The Lions have started out the semester with a l-l count, including a loss to non-conference rival Thiel last Saturday (69-67), and an important win against Lake Erie on Wednesday (60-50). With this recent win, the Lions are looking to keep their No. 1 ranking with a dominating 3-0 conference standing. Attempting to keep their perfect conference standing, Behrend will travel to face Frostburg this Saturday. There was a scarce crowd at the Junker Center Saturday night and half of them seemed to be cheering for Thiel. The Lions started out slowly as the first half saw the Tomcats make 16 of 25 shots for 64 percent holding Behrend to 10 of 23 shooting for 43.5 percent. Behrend fell behind Thiel early on in the game. Tying it up only once during the entire first half of action, 3-3, with 18 minutes left still to go. A missed three-pointer by junior forward Casey Ponsoll marked the end of the half, with Thiel leading 38-30. Down at the half, the Lions roared back and never let the Tomcats have more than a six-point lead before taking over (43-42) with 14 minutes of play left. Some noise was heard at the home court as two free throws by senior guard Steve Merrill increased Behrend’s lead to ten with only 2:14 left to go. A three pointer by Thiel evened out the score at 66 with :26 seconds before the Tomcats pulled out the game, 69-67. In 26 minutes of action, junior center James Curren shot 8 of 13 for 20 points Scott Soltis, Sports Editor it up hard on free throws,” siad coach Dave Niland. “We usually ate one of the better foul shooting teams in the league. We did not shoot them well at the end of the game the other night and it cost us,” said coach Dave Niland. Foul shots that are missed are more noticeable in a tight contest when the score deviates by one or two points. “During the end of the Thiel game we just totally fell apart as a team'” said Casey Ponsoll. “We made a lot of little mistakes that kind of snowballed into big plays for Thiel.” Even after such a frustrating loss, Ponsoll knows this will not have a harsh affect on the team during the upcoming games. “After a tough loss like that however, you just have to forget about it and bounce back the next game and 1 am confident that we will.” Unlike some students, the men’s basketball team didn’t see anything relaxing about the recent break. Two games were played right after the start of the New Year, the first being at the Behrend Tournament playing against Allegheny. Curren led the Lions again with 20 points and eight boards, pushing the team to a 27-19 score at the half against the Gators. Behrend’s 12 of 22 shooting for 54.5 percent in the second half gained the Lions the one point that won that game 53-52. After beating Buffalo State in the first round in the Behrend Tournament 58- 55, the Lions took on RIT making an outstanding 11 of 13 foul shots for 84.6 percent in the second half of action. The Lions kept their winning streak alive by defeating RIT 50-41. Next up for the Lions will be a visit to conference rival Frostburg State on Saturday. “Our defense is letting us down at the moment. You need a tremendous amount of energy to play defense the way we do. We need to go back to basics and get back on track here in the next week," said Fornari. Guard Nikki Pacinelli agreed with this assessment, “We still need to work on helping on defense and at tacking more offensively." The women got that chance Jan. 15 at Lake Erie College in what was a tough conference match up. “They, like every other team in our conference, are very beatable. All we need to do in order to win is play like we can, and play together." said Mozdy Unfortuantcly the team was not able to escape Lake Erie with a win losing a nail biter, 59-58. While the last few games have been discouraging for the team, they and their coach remain optimistic that they can still turn it around. Pacinelli said, “Our expectations have stayed the same. Just to keep working hard and keep trying to form a winning team. We hope to come out on top in our conference and prove that even though we’re young, we have a lot of heart.” in 2003 and made all four free throws. He gathered I 1 total rebounds, two assists and two blocks. Merrill also assisted the Lions with 12 points and a steal, while sophomore forward Jared Clough scored nine points, and sophomore guard Tom Lulich had eight. C'urren now has 951 career points and has led the Lions in scoring seven of nine games Behrend is ranked seventh in the nation in scoring defense at 57.8 ppg and they are also are the best free-shooting team in the AMCC at 72percent. But Behrend missed some crucial free-throws in the last few seconds of the “We always work
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