Coming into Duke women’s basketball’s 2024-25 regular season, some things were more certain than others.
The Blue Devils clearly had a more experienced roster. The squad from Durham returned all but two of its starters, adding talented freshmen in forwards Toby Fournier and Jenessa Cotton along with center Arianna Roberson. Guard Ashlon Jackson was primed for a step forward in her junior season, along with forwards Jadyn Donovan and Delaney Thomas in their second years in town.
But there was uncertainty too. Bad news came in September when it was revealed that Roberson, who would likely have seen significant minutes down low, would miss the entire season with a knee injury. With both of last year’s centers having burned up their remaining eligibility, head coach Kara Lawson’s squad seemed without a true big. The loss of standout center Kennedy Brown was particularly brutal, as she had been the on-floor coordinator of a stifling Blue Devil defense that ranked as one of the best in the nation during Brown’s time with the program.
Lawson knew all of this, too. Duke was polling well among coaches and media following last year’s Sweet 16 appearance and the returning production. But those that followed the program more closely, both from the inside and out, feared that the gaping hole down low would not be easily filled.
“It's only been a few weeks without Ari, but we're capable,” Lawson said at ACC Tipoff in October. “We're just really young, not a lot of experience in the frontcourt. So that's probably going to be our greatest challenge: Our lack of size in the frontcourt, and then our lack of experience.”
The regular season waits for no one. Whether they liked it or not, Lawson and her Blue Devils were going to have to figure it out the hard way. Would this year’s team continue to play its signature defense without Brown at the helm? Would Thomas be able to step into the role of starting center? What type of impact would Fournier make in year one? All questions to be answered.
In the first two games of the season, the Blue Devils ironed out the kinks and got easy wins. They trampled Radford in a Monday-morning home game to start the campaign, then followed it up with a solid performance against Liberty that offered a preview of the type of scoring Jackson and Fournier were capable of. The guard posted 22 points on 5-of-7 shooting from deep, while the Canadian forward put up a respectable 13.
Then came the first test. Duke went north to take on then-No. 18 Maryland and came home with a harsh reality check, an 85-80 upset loss.
“Tough game for us,” Lawson said afterwards. “[The Terrapins'] physicality, their experience, their size really was a difference-maker, particularly in the first half.”
Conceding 85 points in a game certainly wasn’t ideal, either. It seemed like perhaps the famed Duke defense might be a thing of the past.
And yet, the Blue Devils got back on track. They coasted to some easy nonconference wins, with the exception of a close-call 75-71 win against South Dakota State. The Jackrabbits later proved themselves as one of the best mid-major teams in the country. It was Donovan who got Duke over the hump this time, posting 23 points and 15 rebounds.
The next ranked challenges came back-to-back, as the Blue Devils flew out to Nevada for the Ball Dawgs Classic. Two tough opponents in then-No. 9 Kansas State and then-No. 8 Oklahoma awaited, and this time, Duke stepped up to the plate. Jackson dropped a whopping 30 points on the Wildcats, and senior standout Reigan Richardson put up 35 to take out the Sooners in overtime. Coming back to Durham with nonconference games beginning to wind down, the Blue Devils had built valuable confidence. For a young squad trying to figure out its identity, these two were invaluable. Picking up a little hardware never hurts, either.
“We don't fully have our identity yet, but for us to come out here in three days and knock off the caliber of team as Kansas State and Oklahoma [are], it's definitely a big confidence booster for us,” Lawson said following the championship game.
What goes up must come down, though. It was a quick turnaround before Duke took on No. 3 South Carolina on the road, and it was a doozy. The Gamecocks paced the Blue Devils for an 81-70 victory, shutting down a third-quarter comeback attempt. A few more games, including a rough loss to unranked South Florida, closed out Duke’s nonconference schedule. Next up would be a grueling ACC gauntlet, loaded with some of the best teams in the country.
But there were a lot of bright spots. Fournier seemed to be coming into her own on both ends of the floor and stopped getting into foul trouble. Jackson returned to her high-scoring ways, and sophomore guard Oluchi Okananwa presented as a key bench piece. Similarly, forward Jordan Wood had emerged as a surprise contributor off the bench despite seeing almost no time in her freshman year.
After some early wins against weaker league squads, the next test came up against No. 19 North Carolina. And per the past few matchups between the Tobacco Road rivals, it was ugly.
Neither squad cleared the 60-point mark, as the Tar Heels came out with a 53-46 overtime win. Duke went 16-of-68 from the field. It was clear that the Blue Devils were capable of that stifling defense, although it could come at the expense of a strong attack. Fortunately, the loss came early on in conference play.
“This is why you play these games, to be able to put your players in this situation and get minutes and get tape for them to see where they can improve,” Lawson said. “And that's what I told my team after the game.”
From there, it was a five-game winning streak for the squad from Durham. Duke took down some tough teams in Cal and Georgia Tech, each ranked No. 18 at the time of the matchups. Another humbling loss came against an N.C. State squad that was on the rise at the time. The 89-83 defeat featured a whopping 36-point performance from Wolfpack star Aziaha James. Even through the tough loss, Lawson stressed the importance of patience and hard work in her midweek press conference.
“Certainly it's frustrating as a result, you obviously want to win every game that you play, but I'm proud of my group who grew a lot tonight,” Lawson said. “... Sometimes, the game's as simple as that. You'd like to write a complicated thing about what happened, but at the end of the day, [the Wolfpack] made shots in the fourth when they needed to, and we didn’t, and hopefully we can learn from it."
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From that point on, the Blue Devils closed out strong. They dropped just two games of their final eight, losing to a high-flying Notre Dame squad and a punchy Louisville group. For a team that had looked inconsistent to start the season, Duke had clearly made a leap. Fournier had grown into a fully comfortable player on both ends of the floor, solidifying her defense and staying out of foul trouble. Okananwa proved why she was last year’s ACC Sixth Player of the Year, and everyone else was able to play with more consistency down the stretch. While Richardson hit a rough patch in the early months of 2025, she managed to bounce back when it mattered with 23 points on her senior night against North Carolina.
In the road win against Florida State to close out the season, Fournier managed to put it all together. She had 28 points and six rebounds, pulling the Blue Devils over the hump against an offensive juggernaut. With the Canadian forward in the running for ACC Freshman of the Year, Lawson made one final case to the voters postgame.
“I think it's definitely the finest performance by freshmen in a league game this year,” Lawson said. “And it goes without saying, this is the freshman of the year in the league. If you can't see that, I mean, you've got to go to the eye doctor.”
At the end of the day, Fournier took home the trophy, along with first-team All-ACC honors. Besides that, though, laurels were light. Jackson received second-team honors, while Donovan was named to the All-Defensive squad. But other players, including Okananwa and Richardson, went awardless.
Not that it mattered. Duke got hot at the right time. The Blue Devils took down first Louisville, then Notre Dame and finally N.C. State to win the ACC Tournament and guarantee a March Madness bid.
“For us, we faced some of the best teams in the country three days in a row. Look at the seasons that Louisville, Notre Dame and N.C. State have put together, and to be able to come out as a champion is just very, very satisfying for our team that worked hard all year,” Lawson said. “[We] had some ups, had some downs, but we were able to put it all together in a weekend. And that's what you want to be as a team in March that can put it all together. And we showed that.”
Now, as a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament, the group from Durham will need to stay hot. Every game and every opponent will only get tougher from this point on, and it’s all win-or-go-home. Duke begins its journey Friday at 8 p.m., as it hosts No. 15-seed Lehigh to kick off the festivities.
Martin Heintzelman is a Trinity junior and Blue Zone editor of The Chronicle's 120th volume.