Blue Devils blow past UNC

DURHAM — Their expressions told it all.

North Carolina’s usually exuberant assistant coach Andrew Calder stood stone-faced before a timeout with 3:53 left in the second half. Freshman Tierra Ruffin-Pratt buried her face in a towel. Team leaders Italee Lucas and Cetera DeGraffenreid stared blankly ahead.

They all knew. It was over.

Only minutes before, though, a sliver of hope remained with UNC’s fortunes.

After Lucas came off a screen and nailed a 3 at the top of the key with 12:29 remaining, even with the Tar Heels still trailing by 11, North Carolina’s bench and student section sensed a change of momentum.

It seemed that Lucas— as she had so many times before — might will this team back from a seemingly insurmountable deficit.

Assistant coach Tracey Williams-Johnson stood up and yelled at Lucas.

“Be strong,” she said.

But her words fell on deaf ears. No. 18 North Carolina lost to its archrivals from Duke, 79-51, and it wasn’t even that close.

“We’re doing basically a lot of the same things we’ve been doing,” coach Sylvia Hatchell said. “I don’t know (what’s wrong).”

After entering the game with two straight losses, the Tar Heels (16-6, 4-4 ACC) picked up right where they left off.

The No. 8 Blue Devils (19-4, 7-1) began the game on a 10-0 run, and it took a timeout from Hatchell to calm a team that started the half with turnovers from Lucas, DeGraffenreid and Waltiea Rolle.

At the 17:15 mark, sophomore Laura Broomfield painstakingly ended UNC’s woes with a layup, but things continued to devolve throughout the evening.

It took close to nine minutes for the Tar Heels to hit a double-digit point total. Sophomore She’la White committed several fouls and turnovers. Granted, she still was one of UNC’s bright spots — especially in the first half — as she chipped in 10 points with two enormous 3-pointers.

The Blue Devils used a full-court press, and North Carolina panicked. Duke went zone at points, and UNC found itself trapped in corners by double teams. Yet even so, the Tar Heels trailed by just nine points at halftime, 42-33.

It wasn’t enough. Hatchell had several pointed words for her veterans.

“We’ve got to get Italee Lucas and Cetera DeGraffenreid playing better, or they’re going to have to get to the bench,” she said. “It’s not like we don’t have experienced guards, they’re just making really poor decisions. I’m gonna keep changing things up until I find something that works.”

Hatchell certainly didn’t find it in the second half. Within 71 seconds, one of her point guards, White, had turned over her first possession, missed a jumper and committed a push-off foul.

DeGraffenreid continued her poor performances of late with a 0-for-8 night. And Lucas managed just six points while turning the ball over six times.

“(Keturah Jackson) spent 34 minutes on 50 (Lucas),” Duke coach Joanne McCallie said. “That was pretty intense defense.”

By the 9:13 mark, the Blue Devils’ lead stretched to 62-43. And at one juncture, they pushed it to 30.

Hatchell lambasted her team’s rebounding performance afterward. UNC managed just 28 boards, allowing Duke 22 second-chance points.

No North Carolina players were available for postgame interviews to comment on their play, but Hatchell summed up any lingering feelings.

“It’s like we got a little plague or something over in Chapel Hill. I don’t know what it is (with us),” Hatchell said.



Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.