RALEIGH - In its first game since earning the No. 1 ranking, Duke pulled out a sloppy 65-51 win over N.C. State Thursday night at Reynolds Coliseum.
N.C. State (13-6, 2-2 in the ACC) held Duke (19-0, 5-0) to its second lowest point total of the season-the Blue Devils posted only 55 points against Bowling Green Dec. 19.
"We have the utmost respect for State," head coach Gail Goestenkors said. "This was a tough game for us on the road, and [we were] a little emotionally fatigued, I think, from our last game."
Duke won the game by going on a 15-6 run to start the second half. Prior to that, however, the Blue Devils did not look like the same team that blew out then-No. 1 Maryland last Saturday.
Duke and N.C. State exchanged the lead six times in a slow first half in which the Blue Devils failed to establish an offensive rhythm, committing eight turnovers-most of which were unforced. The Wolfpack led by as many as four with only 3:14 remaining in the half.
The Blue Devils' saving grace in the period came from reserve guard Brittany Mitch, who scored eight straight points to take her team from four points behind to four points in the lead.
"[Goestenkors] said, 'Be aggressive,'" Mitch said. "So that's what I did tonight-I was aggressive."
The redshirt freshman scored on a three-point shot, a three-point play after being fouled on a fast-break layup and another layup following a steal off of an inbounds pass under her own basket.
"Those buckets she hit, they were all huge buckets," Goestenkors said. "It just really gave us an emotional lift. Before that, I thought we were a little bit tentative. It was contagious for us in the second half."
The momentum from Mitch's play carried over in the second half in which the Blue Devils offensive woes were briefly put to rest. The team pushed the ball and ran its half-court sets much more effectively to push its lead to as many as 21 points with just over six minutes remaining.
"The first half I don't know that we had any transition layups," Goestenkors said. "The second half I felt like we pushed the ball a little bit more and got out and got easy buckets."
Duke struggled again as the game wound down, though-it scored just seven points over the last 7:19-but the effort was good enough to hold off the ineffective Wolfpack, who shot just 23 percent in the second half.
The 19 turnovers that Duke forced and the 24 points that resulted were some of the few highlights for a team that otherwise seemed out of sync for much of the contest. N.C. State scored five points more than Duke is averaging on defense this season and out-rebounded the team 41-to-37.
Alison Bales was rendered relatively quiet under the basket as she faced off against 6-foot-7 Gillian Goring-possibly the only time this season she will play against an opponent her height.
Team scoring leader Abby Waner shot 0-for-4 from beyond the arc en route to scoring just nine points on the night. In all, only two Duke players put up double digits-Lindsey Harding and Brittany Mitch each scored 10.
"They're not 15th in the nation defensively for nothing," Goestenkors said. "N.C. State is so athletic, and they do such a good job defensively that they were up in our passing lanes and they kept us from running our sets. It was a tough task for us."
Duke next plays Monday at No. 4 Tennessee. The matchup will be the two teams' first meeting since the Blue Devils defeated the Volunteers 75-53 last season.
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