BC Bedevils Duke, Advances to Semifinals

Five minutes remained in Boston College's ACC Quarterfinal matchup against Duke, but the game felt like it started slipping away. The sixth-seeded Eagles harbored dreams of dancing in the NCAA Tournament, but their bubble status appeared to pop. Marnelle Garraud's pass fell into the hands of Makayla Boykin, and a fast break layup by Leaonna Odom handed the Blue Devils a seven-point lead. It was a salted play, the kind that buried a stingy opponent daring enough to stick around for the previous 35 minutes.

Too bad Taylor Soule and the rest of the Eagles didn't get the memo.

Soule buried a step-back fade away before converting an old fashioned three-point play to tie the game in 30 seconds' worth of time. It unraveled the Blue Devils, who promptly gave away a turnover down the other end of the floor. An offensive rebound and layup by Emma Guy, BC had the lead, and the shellshock reverberated all the way through Tobacco Road.

Duke wasn't going to score another point the rest of the way. Boston College defeated the Blue Devils, 84-77, earning a shot in the ACC's semifinal round for the first time in a decade.

"I loved the way every player on our team stepped up," head coach Joanna Bernabei-McNamee said. "Taylor Soule played like a pro, and Marnelle Garraud handled pressure to run the team like a good floor general. I loved the way our bench had everybody's back, and Emma Guy had a double-double. Georgia (Pineau) scored her 1,000th point on her first shot. Everybody was in sync, and when we got out of sync, Duke made their runs, but we stuck together as a team. That was a total team effort, and I'm really proud."

The game represented one of those March Madness, instant classic battles between two teams playing the heights of their own styles. Duke centered its game around superstar Haley Gorecki, who recorded a double-double with 25 points and 10 rebounds while playing every minute. Leaonna Odom added 22 points on 11-of-18 shooting, and the duo distributed eight assists as part of a 22-assist day from the offense.

BC countered with a team-based approach. Soule finished with 26 points, but she was hardly the only Eagle represented on the scoreboard. Emma Guy went 6-of-9 with 10 rebounds, including four on the offensive window, while Makayla Dickens added outside flash with four three pointers. Marnelle Garraud went 5-of-7 from the floor for 12 points of her own.

Six Eagles had at least two assists, including Dickens, who dished five. Georgia Pineau and Cameron Swartz combined for five helpers off the bench, and almost every BC player finished with a positive efficiency rating as the entire team combined for a strong defensive effort that forced 19 turnovers, including six from Gorecki and five from Odom.

"Coach tells us before the game that there are going to be runs," Soule said. "But it depends on who is willing to fight the hardest at the end of the day. When Duke (took the lead), we had to understand that they're a great basketball team, but we had confidence in ourselves to go on runs that are greater than (Duke's). That's how the game turned out."

The win advanced the Eagles to the semifinal round for the first time since they lost to NC State in 2010. Ironically enough, this year's team draws the Wolfpack again in the conference final four after eliminating Georgia Tech, 57-48. It's the third straight appearance in the semifinals for the women's college basketball blue blood, which is also vying for a top seed in the national tournament.

But the No. 2 seed in the ACC Tournament is a long way from its early-January victory over the Eagles. NC State dominated that game in the first quarter, opening up a 15-point lead in the initial period before romping to an 18-point victory. Six players scored in double figures in that game, led by Kai Crutchfield's 14 points.

NC State didn't need six players to score double figures against Georgia Tech. Elissa Cunane and Aislinn Konig poured in 16 points apiece, and Kayla Jones added 10 rebounds in the Wolfpack's debut in the ACC Tournament. The overall team only shot 38 percent from the floor, but the defense smothered Georgia Tech. The Wolfpack offense didn't necessarily blow the Yellow Jackets off the Greensboro Coliseum floor, but it also didn't have to; the Yellow Jackets only shot 1-for-9 from beyond the arc.

"NC State is one of those teams with a lot of players that can score and do dynamic things," McNamee said. "For us, it's going to be a matter of being under control, knowing our personnel and how to guard them. Offensively, we're going to push, even though it's going to be our third game trying to push the tempo to play at our pace."

There is no questioning, though, that the Eagles belong in the national tournament conversation. BC chased Georgia Tech over the past two to three weeks, and the Yellow Jacket loss coupled with the Eagles' win gave the two teams identical, 20-11 records. BC enjoyed a better ACC record than Georgia Tech, and the win over an NCAA-lock Duke team is likely to push BC well inside the top 64 teams in the NCAA's RPI index.

That creates a compelling case for the Eagles, who remained on the outside of ESPN's Bracketology list as recently as Friday morning. The team has arguably a better resume than Georgia Tech, and it's going to be very difficult for the tournament selection committee to overlook a team finishing a power conference bracket as one of the four last teams standing. A win on Friday to advance to the conference championship would make the Eagles a lock, but a very talented team stands between them and a date with a trophy game on Sunday afternoon.

"The importance of every possession, every game, as this team matured (helps us understand) we're going to be tired, (but) the other team is tired (as well)," Soule said. "Those are all just excuses. At the end of the day, we want to win a basketball game. So yes, we had a basketball game yesterday and we have a basketball game tomorrow. (We) just have to fight."

Boston College and NC State will tip off at 2:30 p.m. from the Greensboro Coliseum on Saturday afternoon. The game will be televised on ESPNU with streaming options available through the ESPN platform of devices.

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Players Mentioned

Emma Guy

Cameron Swartz