Duke women's basketball grinds its way to the Elite Eight

NORFOLK, Va.—Fans who stuck around for both games Sunday afternoon at the Ted Constant Convocation Center saw two drastically different contests. The first game ended with Notre Dame nearly hitting the century mark, cruising past Kansas for a 93-63 victory.

The second game was not quite as one-sided or offensively-focused, with Duke and Nebraska combining to outscore Notre Dame by merely five points as the Blue Devils defeated the Cornhuskers 53-45 to advance to the Elite Eight and face the Irish Tuesday evening.

“We set a defensive goal at the beginning of each game and for our game today it was 50, so based on that I’d say we were going to win if we got our defensive stop,” junior guard Tricia Liston said. “Either way it was going to come down to the other side of the floor.”

In a game in which defense was everything, sophomore center Elizabeth Williams and freshman guard Alexis Jones were the catalysts of the Blue Devils’ defensive intensity. Playing in front of a large gathering of friends and family, Williams—a Virginia Beach native—blocked seven shots, forcing the Cornhuskers to settle for outside jumpers the entire game.

“Seven blocks is a pretty amazing stat,” McCallie said.

Duke’s defense only sent Nebraska to the line once, limiting their players to outside jump shots and fade-away layups lest they had their shot blocked by an imposing Williams. The Blue Devils also managed to keep the Cornhuskers guessing, as they transitioned from man-to-man to zone defense constantly.

“They kept mixing up what they were in defensively,” Nebraska senior point guard Lindsey Moore said. “It took us a little bit to realize whether they were in a 3-2 or 2-3 zone. We didn’t handle their changing defenses very well.”

Jones and company managed to force 12 Cornhusker turnovers while only committing nine of their own.

Junior guard Chloe Wells and junior forward Richa Jackson were two of the more notable Duke players to struggle Sunday. Although Jackson started, she has spent the majority of the season coming off the bench and was the only starter to not play at least 30 minutes on Sunday, playing only 21. Jackson and Wells combined to go 2-for-17 from the field, including 0-for-5 from behind the arc.

“We have two players who have never been in this situation before: Chloe Wells and Richa Jackson,” McCallie said. “If you take that out, everybody else is pretty much fine.”

Jackson took more shots than usual, going 2-for-11 from the field, including a pair of missed 3-pointers. McCallie pointed to the Cornhusker defense and Jackson’s inexperience in the tournament as the two main reasons she settled for so many outside shots, which are not her forte.

Survive and advance

Although Sunday’s win had plenty of flays—no bench scoring, no fast break points and 25.0-percent 3-point shooting—Duke has been able to do the most important thing there is to do in March: win.

“We’ve just got to be tough enough, strong enough to push through anything,” McCallie said. “That’s the sign of a championship team.”

For now, the Blue Devils have been able to look to Jones to take over games now that Chelsea Gray is done for the season with a knee injury. With the first half winding down, Jones took over and scored seven points in the final three minutes. Although the offense behind Jones is not putting up the numbers the Gray-led team did, Duke is still managing to win games behind the superb play of its point guard.

“It’s the whole story—we lost Chelsea Gray,” McCallie said. “That’s an All-American point guard. I’m sure she had something to do with our fluidity on offense. We have injured players who have never been here before. You can’t expect things to be as good-looking, 90-80 point game in the NCAA tournament.”

McCallie was adamant after the game that the flash and glam of the regular season is no longer needed. The Blue Devils simply need to keep grinding out victories.

“We don’t want to be pretty, we want to advance,” McCallie said. “We want to find a way to keep going.”