Both the men’s and women’s basketball teams had successful weeks, as the women clinched a spot in the AMCC playoffs with wins in both games and the men hung on to a first round bye in the conference tournament. Senior Night saw the men continue their brief skid, while the women triumphed over Hilbert to get over .500 in conference play. On Saturday, the teams ventured to Penn State Altoona, where they each won in dominant fashion.

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The men’s team experienced a miserable defeat at the hands of the Hilbert Hawks on Wednesday night. Behrend was outscored in both halves and ended up losing by 15 points. Milking the shot clock and a lack of accurate shooting hurt Behrend in the first half, as they were down 30-14 with just over three minutes to go. A small 8-2 run before the half cut the lead to 10 before they cut the lead to as little as two in the second half. The Hawks then started to distance themselves from the Lions as the half went on. Behrend kept it close until about the eight minute mark, when Hilbert began forcing the issue on the Behrend defense, gaining easy buckets and getting to the line often. Justin Gorny and Dan Wanker led Behrend with 16 points each. Gorny added eight boards while Wanker shot just under 50 percent from the field. Mike Fischer obtained 10 points on five boards and five assists. As mentioned, Behrend struggled from the field throughout the game, making only four of 24 threes and shooting 37.9 percent from the field.

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The opposite was true for the women on their Senior Night, as they defeated the Hawks by a healthy margin, that being 18 points in their 59-41 victory. This was only Hilbert’s second conference loss of the season and their sixth overall; they had won eleven straight coming into Wednesday’s game. The game started out evenly enough with the Hawks exploiting their height advantage and Kourtney Beamesderfer scoring Behrend’s first seven points. The game was nip and tuck until the start of the fourth quarter, where Behrend only held a five point lead. They had figured out how to shut down Hilbert’s inside game by this point, but that was taken to a whole new level in the fourth. Behrend held the Hawks to four points and zero field goals in the fourth, and they scored 17 in that same quarter to secure the 18 point win. In her last regular season game at the Junker Center, Erika Woll scored 17 points on 8-8 from the charity stripe. She went off the court to a standing ovation from her teammates and the Behrend faithful with 58 seconds remaining. Beamesderfer continued to shoot lights out from the field, netting a game high 18 points on four of seven from downtown. Autumn Byes also contributed with 10 boards on the evening. With this win, the Lions clinched a spot in the conference tournament and improved to 9-8 in the conference.

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The men’s team was able to get off the schnide on Saturday, as they picked up a solid victory in Penn State Altoona by a total of 18 points. For a sizable portion of the first half, the game was fairly even with each team trading buckets. Behrend then went on an 18-4 run to push their lead to 17, and they did not look back from there. They led at the half by that same deficit, 48-31, tying their largest output in a first half this season. After a run that cut the deficit to eight, Penn State Altoona eventually could not keep up with Behrend’s shooting and were outscored in the second half as well. Behrend, this time around, shot very well from the field, netting nearly 60 percent of their shots and going 48 percent from downtown. A returning Andy Niland led the Lions with 20 points, and dished out six assists; he was perfect from the field and went 8-11 at the charity stripe. Four other Lions scored double figures, those being Malike Brinson, Gorny, Wanker and Fischer. Behrend held Altoona to 6-18 from deep and forced 17 turnovers on the day. Behrend combined for 22 assists on the evening, as well. With the win, Behrend locked up the number two seed in the AMCC Tournament along with a first round bye.

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The women’s team’s stock rose even higher with their victory against Penn State Altoona. With their fourth straight victory, Behrend obtained the number five seed in the conference tournament. Behrend fell behind early and were left at a six point deficit at the end of the first, which turned into a three point halftime deficit. In the third, though, Behrend started to take the game over, using a 19-5 run en route to outscoring Altoona by 17 in the quarter. This proved to be the definitive quarter of the game, as Altoona could not overcome the deficit and lost by 11. Autumn Byes had a double double in the game with 16 points and 13 boards. Woll led the team in scoring with 21 points on 7-19 from the field. Beamesderfer connected on three three-pointers en route to a 15 point performance, and Ally Dillman added nine points and six boards. Behrend forced 28 turnovers in the game, along with scoring 42 of their 73 points in the paint. Just as well, Behrend outscored Altoona by 18 in fastbreak points.

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The men’s team will face off against the winner of the Medaille-Mt. Aloysius game on Wednesday. Game time will be 3:30 pm this Saturday at the Junker Center. The women’s team will have to go on the road to face fourth-seeded Medaille at 8 pm this Wednesday.