No. 13 Duke overcame a large second-set deficit to sweep Wake Forest in straight sets 25-20, 25-23 and 25-20 Friday evening in a hostile environment at Reynolds Gym in Winston Salem, N.C. Despite struggling in the opening set against Georgia Tech Saturday at Cameron Indoor Stadium, the Blue Devils adjusted and controlled the rest of the match, defeating the Yellow Jackets in four sets 23-25, 25-16, 25-21 and 25-16.
“We’re really excited to get the wins,” head coach Jolene Nagel said following Saturday’s game. “It’s been a while since we won at Wake Forest. [For] our seniors, that was the first time they got a win over there. It was important for our team. I liked the way we battled and kept our composure.”
Duke (24-3, 15-1 in the ACC) maintained the balance that has propelled them to the top of the ACC standings in both contests, holding Wake Forest (15-12, 4-11) to a low attack percentage of 0.167 with stingy defense while keeping their own attack percentage at 0.304 for the contest.
After struggling offensively in the first set against Georgia Tech (10-18, 4-12) and finishing with an attack percentage of 0.094, the Blue Devils elevated their play, racking up an attack percentage of 0.464 in the second set and 0.357 in the fourth set to finish the game with a respectable 0.256.
“Some things weren’t really going our way [after the first set],” senior libero Ali McCurdy said. “[Georgia Tech] played great defense and really went after us. We knew that we needed to get back to playing our overall game. We knew that we needed to pick up overall communication to continue to bring the energy.”
McCurdy, the ACC’s all-time leader in digs, racked up 19 against the Yellow Jackets and 13 against the Demon Deacons, spearheading strong defensive performances for the Blue Devils in both games. Duke had 20 more digs than Georgia Tech and had a 53-50 edge over Wake Forest as well.
Sophomore outside hitter Emily Sklar and junior outside hitter Jeme Obeime led Duke’s offense in both games and came up with many timely kills. Obeime and Sklar both finished with double-digit kill totals in both of the weekend's matches, combining for 30 and 29, respectively.
Senior middle blocker Chelsea Cook also reached double-digit kills against Wake Forest and freshman middle blocker Jordan Tucker added 11 against Georgia Tech. The Blue Devils were able to adjust their serving and matchups to their advantage in both games, accumulating 13 aces against Georgia Tech and allowing junior setter Maggie Deichmeister to rack up 97 total assists on the weekend.
“It’s really hard to keep pushing because the season has been so long,” Sklar said. “We worked on refocusing, committing everything we have, [using] all of our resources and doing a lot of homework on these past two teams. I think that really helped out this weekend.”
Both Wake Forest and Georgia Tech tried to punish Duke with aggressive play from their senior outside hitters. On Friday, the Demon Deacons were led offensively by Kylie Hargreaves, who finished with 13 kills and also added nine digs. On Saturday, Jennifer Percy led the Yellow Jackets with 17 kills.
Sklar helped Duke overcome the strong individual offensive performances the team faced with her defensive play, accumulating 10 digs against Wake Forest and 13 against Georgia Tech for her fifth and sixth double-doubles of the season. Her aggressiveness seemed to be contagious late in the match against the Yellow Jackets; in the third set alone, she racked up seven kills and seven digs.
“I just went all out,” Sklar said. “I decided to go for it. I didn’t care if I hit out. I was going to hit it as hard as I can and see what happened.”
With four games left to play, Duke has a two-game lead over No. 22 Florida State (20-7, 13-3) and No. 15 North Carolina (24-3, 13-3) and plays both teams one more time. With a chance to seal an ACC Championship and high seed in the NCAA tournament in the upcoming weeks, the Blue Devils will be all business during the road trip.
“It will be nice getting to go back home,” McCurdy said. “[But] we know we have our work cut out for us. We really need to go out there, play our game and execute.”
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