EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP, N.J. – The Felician College women's bowling team won its final playoff match to capture the third-place trophy and freshman right-hander Kristen Keller (Reading, Pa./Schuylkill Valley) was chosen for the all-tournament team at the Hawk Flight Invite, hosted by Monmouth University on Friday through Sunday at King Pin Lanes. Felician was competing in its final tournament of 2014-15, the program's inaugural season.
Felician went 5-8 in dual matches on the weekend to end up 44-42 for the season. The Golden Falcons were in third place in the six-team field after Friday's five 5-game Baker matches, but slipped to fourth after Saturday's five traditional team matches. They then went 2-1 in Sunday's playoff round, consisting of best-of-7 Baker games, concluding the tournament and the season with a six-game win over Cheyney University in the third-place match.
The individual standings were based on Saturday's traditional competition. Out of 37 entrants, Keller finished third, shooting 905 (181.0 average), highlighted by a 203 in the fifth and final game. It was her second all-tournament selection of the season.
Freshman Jessica Zalewski (Barnegat, N.J./Barnegat) also slipped into the top 10, averaging 166.0 to finish ninth with an 830. Classmate Alexandria Laurenzano (Brick, N.J./Brick Township) was the only other Golden Falcon to start all five games, and she placed 12th in the field (748, 149.6).
Felician felled 4,078 pins (163.1 average) in Friday's Baker competition. But despite sitting in third place to that point, the Golden Falcons went just 1-4 in their dual matches. They began the day by falling to Franklin Pierce University in a tiebreaker after the teams deadlocked at 854, and ended it with a three-pin loss to Saint Peter's University. Laurenzano led off and Zalewski anchored as Felician earned its only victory over the day in Game 4, 822-661 over New Jersey City University.
The Golden Falcons went 2-3 on Saturday, earning wins over NJCU and Saint Peter's. But they slipped to fourth place overall, 51 pins back of Cheyney.
On Sunday, Felician gave itself a chance to win the tournament by defeating Cheyney, four games to one. But the Golden Falcons suffered a five-game loss to Monmouth in the semfinals, before coming back to defeat Cheyney again and claim third place. Felician won Game 6, 163-160, denying Cheyney a chance to force a decisive Game 7.
Franklin Pierce won the event with a five-game triumph over the host Hawks in the championship match. Monmouth's Kaitlyn Reth shot 1031 on Saturday to capture top individual honors.
Felician completes the season with won-lost records of 23-15 in traditional matches, 16-18 in five-game Baker matches, and 5-9 in Baker best-of-7 situations. It was 38-39 against NCAA competition.
Zalewski led the Golden Falcons in scoring average in traditional games, posting a 178.3. Keller was close behind at 177.5.
