Landmark Women's Basketball Players Claim National Honors

MADISON, N.J. - Two Landmark Conference women's basketball players have earned Honorable Mention All-America recognition from a pair of organizations for their play this past season.

Juniata senior Ashton Bankos received honorable mention All-America status from D3hoops.com while Moravian's Alexandra Blair was selected an honorable mention All-America by the Women's Basketball Coaches Association.

Bankos earned consideration for the award after being named D3hoop.com's All-Mid-Atlantic Region Player of the Year, released earlier last week.

The senior guard is just the fourth player in program history to earn All-America honors, with the most recent recipient being Annette Hoffman ('93) who was awarded the Kodak Division III Honorable Mention All-America in 1992 and Division III Honorable Mention All-America in 1993.

Bankos is the 12th women's basketball player in program history to score 1,000 points in her career, while being the first player to combine her 1,000 points with 700 rebounds and 400 assists. She led the Eagles with the Landmark's fifth highest points per game average with 13.1. She drained 381 points during her senior season and was named the Landmark's Player of the Year while also earning first team honors.

Blair was named to the 2012 D3hoops.com All-Mid-Atlantic Region Third, the Landmark All-Conference First Team after being the 2011 Landmark Conference Defensive Player of the year, and she led the 2012 team with highs of 14.0 points and 9.1 rebounds per game. Blair, who became Moravian's 22nd 1,000-point scorer for women in the Landmark Semifinals at Juniata College, also had 104 blocked shots, 57 assists and 24 steals while playing a team high 29.4 minutes per game. This season, Blair shot 75.5 percent at the foul line, making 77 of 102 free throw attempts, and she had nine double-doubles including the first triple-double in school history.

Blair helped Moravian to a 17-12 record and the program's 12th straight postseason appearance with a semifinal berth in the Landmark Conference Tournament. The Greyhounds also earned the second seed in the 2012 ECAC Division III South Championships, and reached the final game in Johnston Hall.

Also this season, Blair earned a spot on the All-Tournament Team at the 11th Annual Starters Moravian Winter Classic back in January, and she has earned Landmark Conference Player of the Week honors twice this season as well as ECAC South Player of the Week honors twice and D3hoops.com Team of the Week accolades once.

Blair finished her career 18th in school history in scoring with 1,065 points, sixth in rebounds with 723 and the school record for blocked shots with 317 in 112 career games. She had a total of 17 double-doubles in her career, and she scored a career high 25 points in the 2012 season finale versus Medaille (N.Y.) College in the ECAC finals.

Story provided by Juniata & Moravian Sports Information