After keeping pace with No.13 Duke for the entire first half, a poor third quarter shooting performance and its lack of size eventually proved to be the downfall for the Massachusetts women’s basketball team in its 70-46 loss at Cameron Indoor Stadium Monday.
Trailing by seven points at halftime and a deficit as low as one after a Cierra Dillard three-pointer with three minutes, 10 seconds remaining in the second quarter, the Blue Devils outscored the Minutewomen (3-6) 19-6 in the third quarter.
Duke’s (8-2) interior presence was felt the strongest in the third as the Blue Devils scored seven of their 13 second-chance points during the 10-minute stretch. UMass shot a dismal 18 percent (2-of-11) from the floor in the third and its lone basket in the paint came from a Kymber Hill layup ending an 11-1 Duke run.
“What happened in the third quarter is that we missed a lot of shots and they went with a bigger lineup,” Minutewomen coach Sharon Dawley said. “It was tougher for our team to rebound against.”
The Blue Devils roster consists of nine players at least six-feet tall as their size helped them to a 45-39 rebounding advantage in addition to outscoring UMass 34-18 in the paint.
All-American candidate Azura Stevens (six-foot-six) led all scorers with 24 points and had a team-high 10 rebounds to go along with her three assists, three blocks and three steals in 29 minutes of action. Center Lynee Belton added 10 points and six rebounds while guard Rebecca Greenwall chimed in with 12 points and seven rebounds of her own.
“Down low, it’s harder to rebound,” Dawley said about Duke’s length. “We haven’t seen that type of size. If you box out, they can still come over and legally get the rebound from you. That’s kind of what happened.”
With the help of a 2-3 zone, the Minutewomen entered the locker room trailing 33-26 holding Duke to a 0-for-6 shooting performance from behind the arc. However while UMass was in striking distance for the entirety of the first half, the Blue Devils never trailed at any moment during the game.
Freshman Bria Stallworth recorded a career-high 20 points while Maggie Mulligan grabbed 12 rebounds of her own.
“We accomplished a lot of the things we came here to do,” Dawley said. “We wanted to see our ladies see what big-time looks like; that we can compete with big-time.
“Now we go home with more confidence. We came here to know that we compete at the highest level and that when we go into the (Atlantic-10) conference, we can certainly not just compete but be very successful.”
Tom Mulherin can be reached at [email protected].
