Coming into Wednesday night’s game, Kate Herlihy was 20 points away from making history and joining the Rowan women’s basketball 1,000-point club. With 7:36 left in the game, Herlihy hit a jumper on the right elbow to secure her place in the record books.

In conjunction with Herlihy’s performance, Rowan took down the Kean Cougars 64-47 to complete the season sweep.

In the first quarter, Herlihy and the Profs came out firing on all cylinders. Rowan began the game on an 18-4 run in the first eight minutes of play, with Herlihy scoring 10 of those points. Despite being just 20 points away from the record, it was not something the senior was thinking about early on.

“I knew I wanted to come out strong,” said Herlihy. “It was not a stress on my mind, I knew I was going to get it today or Saturday. I wanted to get it at home, but it was not something I felt had to do because that would have stressed me out. I started off strong and thought let’s get it.”

Herlihy was not the only hero of the game for Rowan, as Sabrina Araujo also stepped up in a big way. Kean went on a big run at the end of the first quarter and into the second, limiting the Profs to just five points (four of them coming from Herlihy) throughout the first six minutes of the quarter. This allowed the Cougars to come within two points of the Profs. 

Araujo responded by hitting two back-to-back threes that turned the momentum back in Rowan’s favor and got their lead back up to eight. 

“I think they were big threes,” said Araujo. “We needed them to keep up our energy and keep our head in the game.”

Araujo has made a significant contribution to her team recently, scoring 15, 17, and 14 points in her last three games, respectively, leading to three straight wins.

 “I think everything is clicking for me and the team right now,” said Araujo.

Head coach Kate Pearson believes there is one key factor that has helped Araujo play so great in recent games.

“We talked a lot about her confidence,” said Pearson. “Her confidence was not there in the beginning, and in the last three games, she has been confident. That has been a big change for us.”

In the third quarter, the team played exceptional all-around basketball, with the highlight being Shayla Johnson converting her first-ever three-pointer. In addition, Johnson was able to obtain her first career double-double.

Then came the moment in the fourth quarter that cemented Herlihy in the history books.

“Obviously I could tell I was close because my coach was running all the plays for me to score,” said Herlihy. “I couldn’t score there for a second, but after I got it, it was a relief. On top of that, it felt awesome and very fun.”

Pearson called a timeout immediately following the bucket, which led to the team running over toward Herlihy celebrating the moment with her.

“It’s a hard thing to do,” said Pearson. “It was really nice for her to do it on our home floor and our home court in front of her family. She has done a lot of great things on the floor but it is also a credit to her teammates.”

Her teammate and friend Araujo couldn’t be prouder of Herlihy.

“I am so proud of her,” said Araujo. “She deserves it so much. She is such a hard worker and it is just an amazing thing to see her achieve this milestone.” 

This was a moment that Herlihy never thought was possible when she started her career at Rowan University. 

“My freshman year I think I scored 70 points total or something like that,” said Herlihy. “That was not my goal at all, it was not even my goal this year. But it just happened with the flow, and I’m very happy it did.”

It was easy-sledding for the Profs following the big moment. This performance was much more impressive than their previous win at Kean earlier this year, where they won by three.

“We played so much better today,” said Herlihy. “We had so much more energy. We had so much more chemistry than we had at the beginning of the year. We play so much better when everyone has fun. I think everyone was having a lot of fun. Shayla [Johnson] had a double-double, Sabrina [Araujo] was killing it, Kristina [Johnson] was doing amazing, Reagan [Russo] was awesome on defense. Everyone was having fun and doing what they needed to do. That was definitely the difference.”

With the win, the Profs are now 14-7 overall and 10-4 in conference play. They currently hold the No. 3 seed in the New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) and trail both Montclair State and TCNJ with four games left to play.

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