n.c. state falls short to duke

When the final buzzer went off in Sunday's game between North Carolina State and Duke, all of the Wolfpack players were stunned.

North Carolina State had a chance to pull off the biggest upset in the women's basketball season. But Duke left Raleigh with a victory after it came back from a 20-point deficit to beat the Wolfpack 65-64.

While the Blue Devils were smiling and cheering in their locker room, second-year N.C. State coach Kellie Harper was in tears at the press conference.

"I'm brokenhearted," Harper said in the Raleigh News-Observer on Monday. "Our kids proved that they can play with that team. Didn't quite prove we can beat them yet. I hate that because our kids fought hard. We had a great first half. We just have to learn how to finish."

With the win, Duke remains the only undefeated team in Division I women's basketball at 19-0 and looks to pick up its 20th win on Wednesday against Clemson.

"We felt it tonight," Duke senior Krystal Thomas said in the Durham Herald Sun on Monday. "It's our time. We were going to win."

With the heartbreaking loss, the Wolfpack dropped under the .500 mark at 9-10 overall. N.C. State will take a three-game losing streak into Thursday's game with Miami. With 10 regular season games remaining, the Wolfpack hope they turn things around and make another run to the NCAA tournament.

"I think the feeling that all of us have right now is going to fuel us for the rest of the season," N.C. State sophomore Marissa Kastanek said in the N.C. State Technician on Monday. "Yes, it's (the loss to Duke) going to give us confidence because obviously we can play with the number three ranked team, obviously we're good enough to do that. And I think it took a game like this, unfortunately, we had to lose it."

The Wolfpack have five home games remaining. Their next home game will be on Jan. 30 against Florida State as part of their Hoops 4 Hope promotion. The school is raising money for breast cancer awareness and the proceeds will benefit the Kay Yow Cancer Fund, named after the longtime N.C. State coach who passed away in 2009.

A year ago, N.C. State finished 20-14. The Wolfpack finished their regular season by winning five of seven games, then they pulled off three wins in the ACC tournament before losing to Duke in the finals. They lost to UCLA in the NCAA first round at Minneapolis.

This year's team has been on a rollercoaster. The Wolfpack started their season by winning the Wolfpack Invitational, then lost back-to-back road games to Alabama and Richmond. N.C. State was 8-6 after beating Elizabeth City State on Jan. 2 before losing four of its next five games, including Sunday's contest with Duke.

N.C. State was off to a good start against the Blue Devils, taking a 17-5 lead and increasing it 40-22 at halftime. The Wolfpack held the Blue Devils to 22 percent shooting in the first half.

But Duke came back in the second half thanks to its defense. The Blue Devils' full-court press forced the Wolfpack to commit 14 of their 22 turnovers in the second half.

Freshman Chelsea Gray was another key in the Blue Devils' comeback, scoring the game-winning basket with 12 seconds left and finishing with 13 points.

"How many teams do you know that are down 20 and come back and win?" Duke coach Joanne P. McCallie said in the Duke Chronicle on Monday. "That's a very special thing."

But the loss was something N.C. State would go back and say, 'what happened?'

"When you get a lead like that, you start playing not to lose and you can't do that," Harper said in the Herald-Sun. "You've got to have confidence in how you played in the first 20 minutes and realize you can do it again. That's the making of a winning team."

Big jump: After getting a pair of SEC victories over Alabama and Mississippi State last week,

the Georgia Bulldogs made the biggest jump out of the top 25 teams this week, moving from

24th to 20th.

The Bulldogs improved to 16-3 overall and 6-0 in SEC play. Georgia is in second to Tennessee by one-half game in the league standings.

Georgia beat Alabama 60-51 on Thursday and Mississippi State 78-58 on Sunday to extend its winning streak to seven games. The Bulldogs play at South Carolina on Thursday and at LSU on Sunday.

Welcome aboard, Tech: After splitting their two games to Duke and Boston College last week, the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets enter this week's polls at No. 25.

Georgia Tech is 17-5 overall and 5-1 in ACC play. Duke handed the Yellow Jackets their only loss in ACC play with a 69-32 win on Friday.

Georgia Tech travels to Virginia Tech on Thursday and Miami on Sunday.

blue devils continue to sizzle

After the Duke men's basketball team was upset at Florida State last week, the Duke women's basketball team made sure it wouldn't leave Tallahassee with a loss on Friday.

The Blue Devils cruised to an 87-70 victory over the Seminoles and prevented Florida State from pulling off a sweep over Duke in the men's and women's games.

"Credit Duke for playing great team basketball tonight," Florida State coach Sue Semrau said of the Blue Devils on January 18 in the Duke Chronicle."I thought that they were more solid than we were."

So far this winter, things have been solid for the Blue Devils. Duke is one of two undefeated women's basketball teams (the other is Florida Gulf Coast) and is ranked third behind Baylor and UConn. The Blue Devils are 17-0 overall and 3-0 in ACC play and have picked up five wins over teams in the top 25.

Duke will look to stay undefeated on Friday, when it host Georgia Tech in a battle of undefeated ACC teams. Georgia Tech, which is unranked, is 4-0 in league play.

It will be the Blue Devils' first home game since Jan. 6, when they beat Maryland at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Duke is 9-0 at home.

Then on Sunday, the Blue Devils wrap up their weekend with a road game against rival North Carolina State at Raleigh. It's the first meeting between the two schools since Duke beat the Wolfpack in the ACC tournament championship game last March.

Duke is setting its sights on heading to the Final Four at Indianapolis this year after suffering a heartbreaking loss to Baylor in the Elite Eight in Memphis.

Before its road game with Florida State on Friday, the Blue Devils had played four consecutive games that ended in single-digit victories.

Against the Seminoles, Duke made 52 percent (34 of 65) of its shots. The Blue Devils led 40-30 at halftime and never looked back.

Two days later, the Blue Devils finished with a 2-0 road trip with a 57-43 victory over Virginia Tech. The two teams will play each other again on Feb. 20 in Durham.

Duke has been ranked third since Dec. 20, a day after beating Oklahoma State 73-45 on the road. The Blue Devils began their season at No. 6.

Duke has 12 regular season games remaining, including the big contest against two-time defending champion UConn on Jan. 31.

Jasmine Thomas, Karima Christmas and Krystal Thomas make up the Duke seniors and all of them have been valuable members for the Blue Devils. Jasmine Thomas is the team's leader in scoring (15.6 points per game) and three-pointers (26) and assists (60). Krystal Thomas leads the Blue Devils in rebounds (7.7 rebounds per game). Christmas is second in scoring (9.6 ppg) and rebounds (5.6 rpg).

Big jump: Miami continues to be hot as the city itself.

The Hurricanes extended their winning streak to 17 games after beating Boston College 65-53 on Sunday. The win bumped Miami's record to 18-1 overall and 4-0 in ACC play.

"You can coach all your life and never feel this proud of a team," Miami coach Katie Meier said in the Miami Herald on Monday. "And it was just unbelievable guts and effort and energy and commitment to each other. The chemistry in how much they love each other just shows on the court. I'm certainly going to say how much I love this team and how proud I am of this effort."

After an eight-day break, the Hurricanes travel to Florida State on Monday to play the Seminoles.

Welcome back, Dawgs: For the first time since mid-December, the Georgia Bulldogs are back in the polls.

Georgia earned a No. 24 ranking after getting wins over Arkansas and Florida last week. The Bulldogs are 14-3 overall and 4-0 in SEC play and will take a five-game winning streak into their road game with Alabama on Thursday.

auburn looks to get back on winning track

Auburn University had plenty to celebrate on Monday.

The school's football team won its first national championship since 1957 with a 22-19 victory over the Oregon Ducks in the BCS National Championship game at Glendale, Arizona.

After the game, toilet paper was thrown in the trees in Toomer's Corner, which is a tradition at the Alabama school.

Hopefully, the same thing can happen to the women's basketball team this winter.

But first, the Tigers are focusing on getting a winning season. After losing to Vanderbilt 67-59 on Sunday, Auburn is 9-7 overall and 2-1 in SEC play. Last winter, the Tigers finished 15-16 after ending their season with a loss to Kentucky in the conference tournament.

Two seasons ago, Auburn, led by standout DeWanna Bonner, finished 30-4 and reached the second round of the NCAA tournament. It was the Tigers' best season since the later 1980s.

A year ago, the Tigers got off to a 9-4 start in non-conference play. But when the SEC season arrived, Auburn struggled, going 5-11, including a pair of four-game losing streaks.

Last winter, Alli Smalley was the team's top scorer (15 points per game) and Jordan Greenleaf was the Tigers' top rebounder (7.1 boards per game). This year, Smalley is the team's top scorer (12.3 ppg) and Greenleaf is the top rebounder (7.8 rpg).

Smalley and Greenleaf are also the only seniors on the Auburn squad. They lead a team that has a combined eight freshmen and sophomores.

After a 1-4 start, Auburn has won eight of its last 11 games. The Tigers started their SEC season with wins over Alabama and Florida before losing to Vanderbilt on Sunday. Against the Commodores, Auburn came back to tie the game at 33-33 in the opening minutes of the second half. But Vandy later went on a 17-4 run to prevent the Tigers from going 3-0 in league play.

"We had a tough run there in the second half," Auburn coach Nell Fortner said in the Opelika-Auburn News on Monday. "Vanderbilt went on a 17-4 run and that pretty much sunk us at that point. We fought back and battled back hard, but seven turnovers during that run sealed our fate."

The Tigers have a home game on Thursday against Ole Miss and another one on Sunday against LSU. Auburn plays Tennessee at home on Jan. 23.

Auburn has a total of 17 national championships, most of them come from swimming and diving.

In order for the women's basketball team to bring home the school's 18th national title, it must get past powerhouses such as UConn, Baylor, Tennessee, Stanford, Duke among others.

The Tigers played in the national championship game three consecutive times (1988-1990), but they didn't win any of them. Hopefully, the fourth time will be the charm for Auburn.

Save some more toilet paper for April, Auburn.

Big jump: Iowa and Arkansas tied for the biggest jump among the top 25 in this week's polls. Both schools moved up five spots from last week's polls.

Iowa jumped from 21st to 16th after getting Big Ten wins over Minnesota and Ohio State. The Hawkeyes are 14-3 overall and 2-2 in conference play. They play at Michigan State on Thursday.

Iowa climbed to the .500 mark in conference play after beating Ohio State 89-76 in a nationally-televised game on CBS Saturday.

"A great win," Iowa senior Kachine Alexander said in the Iowa City Press-Citizen on Sunday. "I'm still wrapped up in everything...how excited we were in the lockerroom. It feels like our team is really embracing it."

Arkansas jumped from 25th to 20th after getting wins over Mississippi State and Kentucky last week. The Razorbacks are 14-1 overall and 2-1 in SEC play. They play a home game on Thursday against Georgia, which beat Kentucky on Sunday.

Welcome aboard, Miami and Green Bay: The Miami Hurricanes and the Green Bay Phoenix enter this week's polls at 22nd and 23rd respectively.

The Hurricanes, who are in the polls for the first time this year, improved to 14-1 after beating Virginia and Virginia Tech last week. Miami will take a 15-game winning streak into Wednesday's home game against Clemson. The Hurricanes haven't lost since Nov. 17.

Green Bay, which returned to the polls after a four-week absence, bumped its record to 15-1 after getting Horizon League road wins over Cleveland State and Youngstown State last week. The Phoenix play a home game against Loyola-Chicago on Wednesday.

From Syracuse to Seattle, it was a happy New Year's Day for 15 teams

I want to let you know that this blog is not about the Connecticut women's basketball team. Their streak of 90 straight wins is outstanding, but with all of the media talking about the streak coming to an end on Thursday at Stanford, things just got monotonous.

So let's talk about what happened New Year's Day. While everybody -- I had to admit, including myself -- was watching more than 12 hours of college football, a total of 15 women's college basketball teams celebrated New Year's Day with a victory..

One of them is in the same conference as Connecticut and that's Syracuse. The Orange cruised to a 91-56 win over Arkansas-Pine Bluff at home on Saturday. It was Syracuse's 39th straight non-Big East conference win. Sophomore Kayla Alexander, who was named Big East Player of the Week, finished with 21 points, 14 rebounds and five blocks against the Golden Lions, who are 0-11.

The Orange, who are playing at Georgetown on Tuesday to open their Big East season, are off to a 12-1 start for the fourth time in program history. One of those wins included a big, 75-66 victory over Ohio State at home.

Syracuse wasn't the only team that scored 91 points on New Year's Day. Miami finished its non-Atlantic Coast Conference schedule with a 91-52 victory over Lipscomb, bumping the Hurricanes' record to 14-1. Morgan Stroman (20 points, 10 rebounds), Riquna Williams (24 points, 11 rebounds) and Shenise Johnson (25 points, 10 rebounds) each had a double-double for Miami, which only loss was to Nebraska.

Miami won its 13th straight game and will look to extend it on Thursday in its ACC opener at Virginia. The Hurricanes are off to their best start in 19 years.

Delaware State came close to matching Syracuse's and Miami's offensive output on Saturday. The Hornets had five players in double figures and cruised to a 90-58 win over Wesley, a Division III team.

The Hornets (3-8) have two of their last three games after losing five straight. They'll play at North Carolina Central for their final non-conference game. Delaware State begins MEAC play against South Carolina State on Jan. 10.

Also in the East Coast on Saturday, Cornell coach Dayna Smith reached a milestone. She became the school's winningest coach after her team beat cross-town rival Ithaca 58-55. Smith now has 81 victories in her eight seasons as Cornell coach.

The Big Red improved to 2-9 with the victory over Ithaca. They have three non-conference games remaining -- including Monday's contest at Binghamton -- before starting their Ivy League season on Jan. 15 against Columbia.

New Hampshire beat Rhode Island 88-74 in triple overtime in a non-conference matchup between New England schools. Denise Beliveau scored a career-high 25 points -- including seven free throws in the third overtime period -- and grabbed 10 rebounds to help the Wildcats improve to 3-9.

New Hampshire was coming off back-to-back one-point losses to St. Joseph's and Quinnipac last week in the St. Joseph's Hawk Classic at Philadelphia.

"It's so refreshing to see how the girls came back and rose to the occasion," first-year New Hampshire coach Maureen Magarity said in unhwildcats.com. "This (Rhode Island) is a very good Atlantic-10 team."

Cari Reed hit five 3-pointers, including one with 1:40 left in the third overtime that extended New Hampshire's lead to 78-72.

The Missouri Valley Conference had a pair of games. Northern Iowa, which competed in last year's NCAA tournament, lost to Illinois State 69-69 and Indiana State beat Bradley 84-68.

Five players scored in double figures for Indiana State, which began its Missouri Valley Conference season on Dec. 30 with a 71-46 loss to Northern Iowa. The Sycamores improved to 7-6 overall and 1-1 in conference play.

"This was a terrific win for our program, coming back from such a miserable start in Valley play," Indiana State coach Teri Moren said in the Terre Haute Tribune-Star on Sunday. (The Sycamores) bounced back in a big way."

Indiana State's next game will be Saturday against Illinois State, which improved to 9-3 overall and 2-0 in conference play with the win over Northern Iowa. The Redbirds won their fourth straight game.

"Throughout the whole game, I thought our pressure was there," Illinois State senior Emily Hanley said in the Bloomington-Normal (Ill.) Pantagraph on Sunday. "I felt like we were the aggressors. We had an attack mentality offensively and defensively. That helped us get stops and being aggressive on offense was very helpful."

Hanley was named the MVC Player of the Week after helping the Redbirds win three games last week. She averaged 18 points in those three games.

Illinois State will play a non-conference game at Northern Illinois before returning to MVC action on Saturday against Indiana State.

Staying in the Midwest, Toledo beat North Dakota 71-55 at home to wrap up its non-conference season. The Rockets improved to 8-5.

Senior Melissa Goodall finished with a career-high 25 points, along with five assists, eight rebounds and two blocked shots for Toledo, which opens its Mid-American Conference play on Wednesday against Ball State.

"We haven't had a very good start to any of our games this season," Goodall said in the Toledo Blade on Sunday. "It was good to kind of get things going early. If it was somebody else getting the six points, that would have been just fine. I'm glad we started off well."

Heading south, Central Arkansas and Louisiana-Lafayette celebrated New Year's Day with victories. Central Arkansas blew past Oklahoma Wesleyan 87-40 and Louisiana-Lafayette beat North Texas 65-54.

Central Arkansas forced Oklahoma Wesleyan to score the fewest points out of the 30 teams that played on New Year's Day. The Bears, who will play Ecclesia College on Tuesday, improved to 7-5 and have won five of their last six games.

Louisiana-Lafayette celebrated its first win in Sun Belt Conference play with the win over North Texas. The Rajun' Cajuns (8-7) started league play last week with a loss to Denver.

Out west, Utah improved to 7-7 and extended its winning streak to three games with a 73-61 win over in-state rival Utah State. The Utes played their last non-conference game before starting their Mountain West Conference season on Thursday against Air Force.

"The big thing is that we're getting better every day," Utah coach Anthony Leverets said in the Salt Lake City Tribune on Sunday. "Having time to actually practice is huge. We've had some great practices in the past few weeks, and you can see the improvement on the court."

Another Mountain West Conference team also played on New Year's Day, but didn't get the win. BYU lost to Nevada 57-53. Nevada extended its best-ever start to 11-2 and begins its Western Athletic Conference play on Thursday against Idaho. Wolfpack senior Johnna Ward scored a season-high 17 points, including five 3-pointers.

"I'm really proud of my team because they've found a lot of different ways to win all year," Nevada coach Jane Albright said in the Reno Gazette-Journal on Sunday. "Tonight, it was just grinding it out."

A pair of Big Sky Conference teams -- Idaho State and Montana State -- picked up wins on Saturday. Idaho State improved to 9-4 with an 84-51 win over Montana Tech, and Montana State beat Utah Valley 79-70 to extend its winning streak to four games and improve to 6-8.

In the final game on New Year's Day, Seattle University snapped a four-game losing streak with a 62-50 win over Navy at home. The Redhawks (5-11) were led by senior Salena Dickerson with 22 points.

"Confidence is really contagious and it passed around to a lot of people," Seattle U coach Joan Bonvicini said in the Seattle Times on Sunday. "We didn't start real good in the second half, but we showed poise down the stretch and got to the free-throw line. It just made us much more aggressive."

Seattle University, an independent team, will play Cal State Bakersfield, another independent, on Sunday.

Big jump: Stanford and DePaul tied for the biggest jump among the top 25 teams this week. The two teams moved up five spots from last week's polls.

Stanford, which beat Xavier, Connecticut and rival Cal last week, moved up to No. 4 with a 10-2 record. DePaul, which didn't play last week, jumped to No. 16. Ironically, the two teams met earlier this season, with DePaul pulling off a 91-71 over Stanford.