Moon Township, Pa. / Charles L. Sewall Center-Sophomore Artemis Spanou (Rhodes, Greece / Nea Smyrni (Greek National Team)) and junior Briannica Tye (Aurora, Ill. / West Aurora (Mineral Area)) both reached the 20-point plateau as the Robert Morris University women's basketball team defeated the Akron Zips, 85-78, at the Charles L. Sewall Center Wednesday morning. The Elementary School Day game hosted over 700 students from three local elementary schools that made up the regular-season record crowd of 885.

Spanou tied her season-high for points with 24, going 10-of-18 from the floor. She also had seven rebounds, two blocks and two steals in 35 minutes of action. Tye eclipsed her career-high with 22 points, going 6-of-13 from the field and knocking down 10-of-15 shots from the charity stripe. She tacked on six rebounds, five assists and four steals as she filled the stat sheet.

Senior Mary Durojaye (London, England / Barking Abbey (British National Team)) earned her fourth double-double of the year with 12 points and 12 rebounds. She hit all four of her free throws and went 4-of-7 from the floor. Freshman Catherine Matthews (Barrington, R.I. / Barrington) was impressive in her first game with extended playing time, tallying eight points, drilling 2-of-4 three-pointers and adding a pair of free throws.

The Colonials opened the contest by holding the Zips scoreless for 4:10 en route to a 6-0 lead. The Zips ate into the lead, eventually tying the contest at 12-12 when Carly Young drilled a three-pointer from the right wing with 10 minutes left in the first half. A jumper by Spanou and a couple of lay-ups by Durojaye off of nice assists from freshman Romane Dessacs (Péchabou, France / Bellevue) fueled an 8-0 RMU run.

Eight straight points by Akron tied the score as Taylor Ruper caught fire from three-point range. She hit three of them in the final six minutes of the half, giving Akron a short-lived one-point lead. A Tye jumper and a three-pointer by junior April Williams (Bronx, N.Y. / Murry Bergtraum (Monroe College)) gave RMU a 30-29 lead at the break.

The lead went back-and-forth seven times over the opening seven minutes of the second half. Matthews made two shots from the charity stripe tying the game for the seventh time before burying a three-pointer to give the Colonials the lead with 12:37 left to play. A jumper and two freebies by Spanou capped a 7-0 run that left RMU holding a 54-47 lead.

The lead would stretch to as many as nine points with 2:33 left to play, but a 9-3 surge over 1:24 cut the Robert Morris margin to three points on another timely three-pointer Young with 69 seconds left. The Colonials would hit 7-of-8 free throws down the stretch, however, to hold on to the 85-78 win.

Ruper finished with 21 points going 7-of-16 on three-pointers. Jasmine Mushington added 15 points and Young added 13 points.

Robert Morris shot 45.6 percent (26-57) overall and went 5-20 (25.0 percent) on three-pointers. They shot a season-best 87.5 percent from the charity stripe hitting 28-of-32 attempts. The Colonials outrebounded the Zips, 41-35, and held Akron to 39.1 percent (27-69) from the floor.

RMU is off until Dec. 31, when they travel to Duquesne for a 1:00 p.m. game at the A.J. Palumbo Center.