FLUSHING, N.Y. (Feb. 13, 2019) – The Queens College women's basketball team roared to life on the offense by hitting the half-century mark in the first half of a 92-76 victory over Mercy College on Wednesday (Feb. 13) at Fitzgerald Gymnasium.

Queens (5-17, 4-10 ECC) opened the game on a 12-2 run backed by two threes from Beth Bonin and four points from My'eesa Grant as the Knights were rolling from the get-go against Mercy (4-19, 1-12 ECC). The hosts led 16-5 at the mid-point of the quarter on a jumper by Emer Moloney and Queens would extend its lead to a 28-16 margin after one quarter of play. The second quarter started off with a bang as Bonin connected on another long-range jumper and the Knights continued to set an insurmountable pace in the frame. Nora Gabel would hit a pair of jumpers in the quarter and Maia Fawcett ran off seven points in the period as QC set a season-high for first-half points, taking a 51-33 lead into the break. Mercy scored the final four points of the first half, however, and would carry that momentum into the second half.

The Mavericks hit on the first two jumpers of the third quarter, forcing an early time-out as Mercy had gone on an 11-2 run to come back within a 14-point deficit at 51-37 in the first minute of play. Queens would regain its form and extend the lead to a 20-point margin on a jumper by Lucy Tougas, but a 12-2 run from the Mavericks actually brought the contest to within single digits as a jumper by Brianne Santos cut the Knights' lead to just nine points at 63-54 with two-and-a-half minutes remaining in the quarter. A lay-up by Tougas and a buzzer-beating jumper from Kaitlyn Mahon gave the Knights a 67-54 edge going into the final quarter of play and Mercy would not reduce the deficit to single digits again.

Bonin---on a night in which she was honored in a pregame ceremony for scoring her 1,000^th career point on Sunday (Feb. 10)---led all scorers with 23 points, going 8-for-14 from the field and hitting four shots from beyond the three-point line. Tougas accumulated 18 points and hit 8-of-13 from the floor with Mahon (12 points, 10 assists) scoring her second double-double in three games on the home-stand. Gabel added 13 points off the bench with Grant contributed eight total points and a game-best 14 rebounds as Moloney was just shy of her own double-double with nine points and nine rebounds.
Abigail Collier had a team-high 18 points for Mercy as Amber Brown added 16 and Santos chipped in 11 in the loss.

The 92-point effort marked the first time that Queens had eclipsed the 90-point plateau since the opening contest of the 2016-17 season, in which QC knocked off Southern Connecticut by a 90-86 score. It also was the first time that the Knights hit 92 points since Jan. 5, 2015---one day after the Knights faced Immaculata University at Madison Square Garden. In that effort, Queens romped to a 92-34 victory over Concordia (N.Y.).

Queens will take a short trek for its next contest as the Knights head up to Bridgeport on Saturday (Feb. 16) to face the Purple Knights in a 1 p.m. showcase.