Continuing their trend of nerve-racking victories, the Blue Devils eked out another close win this evening defeating Temple 71-64 at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
Although the Owls were within four points with 25 seconds to play, Karima Christmas put Duke on her back in the final seconds like she did the entire game. She led the Blue Devils with 20 points, and made Temple coach Tonya Cardoza regret her defensive game plan that gave Christmas room to maneuver.
"They left me open and I shot it. It's not like I haven't hit shots so I don't know why somebody would play me like that," Christmas said. "If I had an open shot I took it, if I had an open lane I took it. I was just in attack mode at all times."
Duke built a 15-point lead with 4:20 to play and it appeared the victory was a foregone conclusion. But in the next three minutes, the Owls went on a 12-3 run to bring the game within striking distance, leaving head coach Joanne P. McCallie frustrated with her team's effort down the stretch.
"Not good focus there. Some critical shots go up; they're a very good shooting team. We didn't do anything to stop [Qwedia Wallace] in her homecoming," McCallie said. "We were a little aloof there at the end and that will be something we can look at and learn from."
Wallace led all scorers with 21 points and added four assists and five rebounds.
Yet, the real story in women's college basketball this evening is the loss of No. 1 Connecticut, which fell to No. 6 Stanford. The Cardinal's victory snaps a college record 90-game winning streak for the Huskies. Duke is scheduled to take on Connecticut on January 31st, which if the streak had continued, would have been the potential 100th game in the winning streak for the Huskies.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.