Brittany Snyder was deadly from the floor as she nailed three of her six three pointers and scored 16 points during the recent game win over Bridgewater.

Ideally, Brittany Snyder would be ²ÝÝ®ÉçÇø’s featured scoring threat.

The petite shooting guard has a quick release and lots of touch, especially from 3-point range. But Snyder has a thyroid condition that can instantly sap her energy, making her a game-time decision every time the Lady Royals play – or practice – since it was diagnosed in December 2008.

"It’s really tough," said Snyder, a Riverheads High School graduate. "Some days, I come in here and I’m feeling good, and then I get going and then I just crash at practice, and it’s just no good. Sometimes, I’m hovering over the trash can."

Tuesday night was not one of those nights.

Snyder leads in scoring

Snyder – a 5-foot-6 junior who missed EMU’s Jan. 2 win over Hollins with one of her "bad days" – came off the bench to score a game-high 16 points and lead the Royals to a 68-55 win over Bridgewater College in an Old Dominion Athletic Conference women’s basketball game at Yoder Arena marred by 43 turnovers and 35 fouls.

"Brittany, who didn’t play on Saturday, came out and hit some big shots tonight," EMU coach Kevin Griffin. "This a kid who sometimes can play, sometimes she can’t. Tonight was her night and she buried some shots."

Danielle Rittenhouse during a 12/5 game against Virginia Wesleyan.

Eastern Mennonite – 9-0 overall, 5-0 in the ODAC and off to its best start ever – also got contributions from Melissa Lewis and Danielle Rittenhouse.

Lewis, a nimble senior point guard and Stuarts Draft grad, added 15 points, and Rittenhouse, a freshman guard, added 11.

Lewis also made eight of nine free throws – including 4-for-4 in the final 1:03 – to help the Royals secure the win. Snyder went 5-of-6 from the line and made three of six from 3-point range.

"We say go get to the free-throw line," Griffin said. "That gives us a chance to rest, gives us a chance to set our defense, and it gets the other team in foul trouble."

All of those things were true Tuesday.

Fouls make trouble for BC

Melissa Lewis during the EMU Tip-Off Classic in late November 2009.

After having just three fouls in the first half, Bridgewater (3-4, 1-3) picked up 16 in the second, including one behind the 3-point line on Snyder with 10:09 to play.

Snyder, a 73-percent free-throw shooter, made all three to push the Royals’ lead back to double digits.

"We started getting out of position," said 6-1 BC freshman forward Jackie Buckley, who led the Eagles with 14 points and 11 rebounds. "In the beginning, we were playing really good defense. We were cutting them off, and in the second half, we didn’t give them that step, and they got around us and we lost position."

EMU extended its lead to a game-high 16 twice with under a minute to go after Bridgewater kept it within 10 for most of the game.

"I still have good days and bad days," said Snyder, who also is nursing a sore thumb and wrist – both of which are discolored and swollen. "But right now, I’m having more good than bad, so I’m thankful for that."

Learn more about the 2009 Lady Royals:

• Women’s basketball home
• Season schedule
• Head coach Kevin Griffin
  

]]> /now/news/2010/royal-men-ranked-in-national-poll-for-first-time-ever/ Wed, 06 Jan 2010 05:00:00 +0000 http://www.emu.edu/blog/news/?p=2122 For the first time in school history, Eastern Mennonite has cracked the top 25 of a national poll in men’s basketball. The Runnin Royals have already set the mark for best start in school history, and this week took the No. 24 spot in the D3hoops.com national ranking.

Read more…

Junior Katie Lamm scored her team leading third goal of the season against Frostburg State. (Courtesy Wayne Gehman)

Jen Edris’ place as the second-leading scorer in EMU women’s soccer history is more than a little fleeting and she knows it.

All it’s going to take is one goal, or even two assists, by junior Katie Lamm sometime between now and the end of the 2008 season for Edris – who is in the EMU record books under her maiden name, Jennifer Morey – to fall back to third.

But don’t go anointing Lamm as No. 2 in Edris’ presence just yet.

“He-hem, third,” Edris, now an assistant coach at EMU, jokingly bristled after practice last Thursday when a reporter suggested that Lamm was already second on the list. “I was just telling her, I don’t know why anyone would want to interview you. You’re not even in the top two in all-time scoring.”

“We’ll change that tomorrow,” Lamm shot back in a half-hearted attempt to feign cockiness, a personality trait she doesn’t appear to possess.

Surprisingly, she was wrong, and Edris’ mark survived the weekend. On Friday, Lamm was shut out for the first time this season in a 2-0 loss to Roanoke, and Sunday she failed to score again in the Royals’ scoreless tie with Goshen College in Lancaster, Pa.

That allows Edris to stay No. 2 at least until Saturday, when the Royals (3-2-1) play at Old Dominion Athletic Conference rival Lynchburg, but it’s hard to believe she’ll get to enjoy it much longer than that. Only once in Lamm’s EMU career – in the final three games of last season – has she suffered through a scoring drought longer than two games.

Several Records in Sight

With seven goals this season, Lamm has a career total of 41, which is already good for second all-time behind only 2004 graduate Ellie Lind, who finished with 76. Lamm’s 86 total points are surpassed only by Edris’ 87 and Lind’s 183.

The points record is probably out of reach. Lamm isn’t piling up assists with quite as high a frequency as she is goals – she has four in her career – and Lind finished with a school-record 31. But the forward from Newmanstown, Pa., is nearly on pace to score more goals than anyone in the history of the Park View school.

“It’s a goal I think she’s set for herself,” coach Holly Shifflett said. “There’s no doubt in my mind she’ll be able to do it.”

Shifflett feels so strongly about Lamm’s chances because the former East Lebanon County High School star has already overcome several obstacles that could’ve derailed her pursuit.

Injuries Not an Obstacle

After scoring 15 goals as a freshman and earning ODAC Rookie of the Year honors, Lamm grinded through injuries as a sophomore. In one of the season’s first practices, she collided with assistant coach Jonathan Kratz – who was playing to give the Royals enough for an 11-on-11 scrimmage – and sprained the medial collateral ligament in her right knee, an injury that still forces her to wear a bulky knee brace.

Later that season Lamm suffered a sprained right ankle, forcing her to tape her right leg nearly from thigh to foot.

“Trainers loved me,” said Lamm, a health and physical education major who also works in the athletic trainer’s office and is thinking about pursuing a master’s degree in athletic training. “They had to buy a whole extra box of tape just to deal with me.”

And in addition to being hampered by physical ailments, she had to deal with opponents doing everything in their power to slow her down. Sometimes she faces double and even triple teams, but that still didn’t keep her from scoring 19 goals, good for third in the ODAC, and earning first-team all-conference honors.

“I don’t think about it,” Lamm said of getting marked. “People say,