Duke women's basketball controls offensive glass in upset of physical Florida State side

<p>Leaonna Odom exerted all-around dominance in the Blue Devils' exhibition contest.</p>

Leaonna Odom exerted all-around dominance in the Blue Devils' exhibition contest.

For the tallest team in the ACC, it might seem counterintuitive that one of Duke’s biggest concerns heading into Monday night’s game was rebounding. 

But against Florida State, one of the top three rebounding teams in the nation, the Blue Devils flipped that worry on its head with a dominant performance on the boards. 

In No. 20 Duke’s 79-66 home upset of the ninth-ranked Seminoles, the key to the game was not redshirt senior Lexie Brown’s 30 points, nor classmate Rebecca Greenwell’s six 3-pointers, but rather the team’s best offensive rebounding performance this season. The Blue Devils grabbed 24 offensive boards, including 16 in the second half, while holding Florida State to just 14 in the game and six after the break. 

The season-high total on the offensive glass helped Duke outrebound the Seminoles 48-37. 

“The rebounding, the hustle plays, all the intangibles—we didn’t shoot as well as we can, but we didn’t put our heads down,” Blue Devil head coach Joanne P. McCallie said. “You’ve got to do the blue-collar things, and I thought the team did.”

The result was possibly Duke’s most impressive rebounding performance of the season. Although the large margin was the result of a concerted team effort, several individual performances stood out. Greenwell contributed nine rebounds in addition to her 22 points, and senior Erin Mathias added eight more boards. 

However, sophomore Leaonna Odom led the charge on the glass for the Blue Devils, grabbing 12 boards, seven of them offensive, while also putting up 15 points for a double-double. 

“[Odom], especially, and Erin [Mathias] were getting all my missed shots down there and putting them back in,” Greenwell said. “I’m proud of the way we came out on the boards tonight.”

Florida State, which entered the game with an 11.7 average rebounding margin, struggled to get second-chance opportunities, scoring just eight points off offensive rebounds. Duke, on the other hand, turned its second chances into 19 points, its second-highest total in that category this season. 

One of the most notable aspects of the Blue Devils’ success on the boards was how quickly their advantage turned coming out of the break. At the end of the first half, Florida State held the edge in rebounds and trailed by only three points. 

But as Duke took off on the boards in the second half, the Seminoles seemed to have no answer. 

Time and again, the Blue Devils were the ones hustling under the basket for a loose ball, staying active whenever a shot went up and crashing the boards as a team. At points, especially in the fourth quarter, the Seminoles simply looked defeated after yet another Duke missed shot turned into a preventable second-chance opportunity. 

“We just didn’t do our job on the boards. That’s not like us. We did a terrible job boxing out, and they did a great job rebounding the basketball,” Seminole head coach Sue Semrau said. “Our minds weren’t in the right place. We didn’t focus in on what we needed to, and that’s so unlike our team.”

For Greenwell, the game provided an extra measure of redemption against a program that has had her number in the past, holding her to fewer than 10 points and five rebounds per game in her career. Her performance Monday in perhaps her final meeting with Florida State was her most impressive, and she has now grabbed at least eight rebounds in seven straight games.

“I’m really proud of Becca and [her] rebounding,” McCallie said. “I know scoring is very impressive as well, but boy, her rebounding makes an enormous difference on our team.”

Rebounding will be key for the Blue Devils again next Sunday as they wrap up their season at home against North Carolina. Duke lost in overtime on the road in Chapel Hill to the Tar Heels in January despite controlling the glass—nevertheless, replicating Monday’s hustle on the boards would go a long way toward preventing another upset. 

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