When the women's basketball team began the 1994-95 season, one of the team's goals was to win 20 games. Duke first had the chance to capture that 20th win at home on Feb. 20, when it played Clemson. The Blue Devils lost that game 88-82 in overtime.
Duke (19-7 overall, 10-6 in the Atlantic Coast Conference) will have a second chance against Clemson to earn that elusive 20th victory when it faces the Tigers in the first round of the ACC tournament today at 12:30 p.m. in Rock Hill, S.C.
"Personally, I'm glad that we're playing Clemson because they were the team that kept us from winning our 20th game when we should have," head coach Gail Goestenkors said.
"It's a chance to redeem ourselves and I hope that we will."
The players share Goestenkors' feelings concerning the third opportunity to capture their first win against the Tigers this season. The Blue Devils were blown out against Clemson on the road, 78-64, on Feb.1.
"We're looking forward to it because both times that we played them, we didn't play our best basketball," sophomore point guard Kira Orr said. "We know that we can beat them. We're just focusing on the fact that we're the better team, and that if we do what we have to do to play well, then we will beat them."
The game against Clemson is also crucial to the Blue Devils and their hopes of receiving a bid to the NCAA tournament. While the conference coaches feel that the selection committee should allow five ACC teams in the tournament, Goestenkors knows 19 wins places Duke "on the bubble."
"We definitely have to win the first game in the tournament in order to feel good about the fact that they are going to take us in," Goestenkors said. "We need to get this win against Clemson to help our cause. It's possible that we could get in without it, but we don't want to rely on anybody else when we can take control of the situation ourselves and really control our own destiny."
Last season, the Blue Devils were in a similar position when they played Maryland in the first round of the ACC tournament. Duke was 16-10 and trying to break a three-game losing skid when it faced the Terrapins, and a win was necessary to keep its NCAA hopes alive.
The Blue Devils were blown out by the Terrapins 60-45 and failed to receive a bid to the tournament.
"Last year was last year, and we put that behind us," Orr said. "Right now we're just focusing on this year and beating Clemson, getting our 20th win and hoping to get to the NCAA tournament. We don't want to dwell on what happened last year--we learned our lesson. We don't want that to happen again."
The players are also looking at the opportunities that lie past Clemson. The winner of the Duke game will face the winner of today's Maryland-Virginia game, while the winner of the North Carolina-Wake Forest contest will take on the winner of the N.C. State-Georgia Tech game.
With a win over then-No. 3 UNC and a recent six-point loss to No. 8 Virginia, the Blue Devils think they have a chance to win the entire tournament.
"This is a time where a lot of teams are very vulnerable because they are looking forward to the NCAAs, and they can look past this tournament," Orr said.
"Last year, we may have been looking to win only the first-round game, but this year we're looking to win the whole tournament. We think it is something we can actually achieve."
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