Women's Basketball | 1/21/2019 8:52:00 AM

FAIRFAX, Va. – A pair of George Mason incoming freshmen for the 2019 fall semester have been nominated for one of high school basketball's premier national showcases.

Rachel Balzer and Tamia Lawhorne were nominated for the 18th annual McDonald's All-American Game. Balzer was one of 23 players nominated from her home state of Pennsylvania while Lawhorne was one of just 17 nominated from New York.

More than 800 male and female high school seniors were nominated for the games, which will be played on March 27 in Atlanta. The final rosters, which will be narrowed down to 24 players for each of the boys and girls teams, will be announced on Jan. 24.

Balzer, a 5-foot-10 guard from Doylestown, Pa., earned All-Inter-Ac Second Team honors as a junior at Germantown Academy in 2017-18. As a sophomore, she earned First Team All-Inter-Ac accolades and was named the 2016-17 Offensive Player of the Year.

The sharpshooter has led the Southeastern Pennsylvania area the last two years in 3-pointers made. She also played AAU basketball for the Philadelphia Belles. She has been named to the dean's list four times and plans to pursue a major in elementary education. 

Lawhorne, a 6-foot guard/forward from Amityville, N.Y., averaged 13 points a game as a junior at St. Anthony's in New York before transferring to Long Island Lutheran for her senior season this winter. An all-conference selection, she was also named rookie of the year. She plans to pursue a major in business administration or sport management.

They join three other current Patriots to have been nominated for McDonald's All-American Game: seniors Casey Davis and Jewel Triggs and sophomore Nicole Cardaño-Hillary.