South Florida Women's Basketball Takes No. 9/10 Duke, 65-56

hroughout the early portion of the season, Duke has had trouble starting off fast. The Blue Devils have had a mixed bag of results trying to come back. Against Kansas State, Duke had an early 10-point deficit in the first quarter but managed to pull out a 73-62 win. On the other hand, the Blue Devils found themselves with a 25-point deficit in the third quarter against powerhouse South Carolina and fell short in the end, despite cutting the lead to single digits.

In a hostile away game at the Yuengling Center against South Florida before a long-awaited break, Duke could not dig itself out of a massive first-half hole, losing 65-56. Heading into halftime, the Bulls lead 33-15 after a dominant 20 minutes. But in typical Blue Devil manner, head coach Kara Lawson and her team weren’t going to collapse.

Coming out of the half, standout guard Taina Mair had a quick steal leading to a layup by sophomore Oluchi Okananwa. Soon after, Reigan Richardson — who racked up 10 assists in the team’s last game against Wofford — hit a three. The Blue Devils weren’t going to back down, and it did so by playing its brand of basketball. It quickly forced five South Florida turnovers, almost matching the number of turnovers the Bulls had in the first half. Additionally, South Florida didn’t make a single three in the third quarter, which was what gave it the lead in the first half.

However, the Bulls held on despite only being up three points in the fourth quarter. Senior L'or Mputu kept South Florida afloat when no other players could. The Kinshasa, Congo, native scored a career-high 17 points in comparison to her 7.5 points per game average. After a controversial technical foul on Duke forward Delaney Thomas which gave four free throws to South Florida, the Blue Devils attempted to rally once again. Their 11 points off turnovers kept on creating offensive production in transition, but it was too late as the leading scorer of the game for the Bulls, Sammie Puisis, drained her third three of the day.





https://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2024/12/duke-womens-basketball-south-florida-game-analysis-comebacks-first-half-slow-starts-turnovers-lawson-richardson-okananwa