Release courtesy of Albany Pharmacy Athletics
Albany, N.Y. – Senior guard Alexa Schooley (Auburn, N.Y.) led all scorers with 20 points and grabbed nine rebounds, but it was not enough to lead the Albany College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences women's basketball team to a win Saturday as the Panthers (5-2, 0-1 HVIAC) fell 69-56 to visiting Berkeley College (5-1, 1-0 HVIAC) in the Hudson Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Conference opener for both squads.
Berkeley scored the game's first six points and led by as many as 10 in the early going before ACPHS got untracked and chipped the deficit down to 20-15 with 11:12 to play in the first half. The Knights hit nine of their first 11 field goal attempts and kept the Panthers at arm's length for most of the first period's remainder until a half-ending 8-2 run, punctuated by senior guard Megan Serley's (Oriskany, N.Y.) buzzer-beating 12-foot floater, made it a 34-32 Berkeley lead at the break.
Serley scored just 22 seconds into the second half to tie the game at 34, but a 6-0 Berkeley run would then give the Knights a lead they would not relinquish. The Panthers battled back from a seven-point deficit to come within one with less than 5:30 to play before Berkeley's Milan Germany converted a three-point play to put her team back up by four.
ACPHS again tried to rally back as Schooley knocked down a pair of free throws that made it 54-52 with 4:14 remaining, but Champagne Hazel's three-pointer on the ensuing Knights possession ignited a 15-0 run in the final minutes that put the game out of reach.
Although just three for nine from the floor, Schooley used a perfect 13-13 performance from the free throw line to finish with a game-high 20 points. She contributed nine rebounds and four steals to the Panthers cause with Serley adding 16 points of her own. Freshman forward Dannie Grifin (Paramus, N.J.) pulled down a game-high 13 rebounds to go along with six points and four steals.
Hazel finished with 17 points, five rebounds, four assists and four steals to lead four Knights in double figures. Germany notched a 16-point, 11-rebound double-double with six assists and three steals for good measure while Janay Thomas (14 points) and Patricia Patterson (11 points, seven rebounds) also aided the Berkeley cause.
The Panthers are back in action at 1:00 pm Sunday when they visit the College of New Rochelle in an HVIAC contest. Berkeley visits HVIAC rival The King's College at 6:30 pm Monday, December 8.
