12/3/2020 basketball Edit

NC State Wolfpack women defeat No. 1 South Carolina 54-46

Justin H. Williams • TheWolfpackCentral

Staff Writer

NC State Wolfpack women's basketball defeated No. 1 South Carolina 54-46 in Columbia Thursday night to advance to 3-0 on the season.

The Gamecocks had won 29 straight games entering the contest, but the Pack ended the streak in its first win over a No. 1 ranked team in 13 years and the first under head coach Wes Moore.

The last time the Wolfpack defeated a No. 1 team was against Duke in the 2007 ACC Tournament in the Kay Yow era.

NC State Wolfpack basketball Kayla Jones — Senior forward Kayla Jones had a team-high 16 points and 12 rebounds in the 54-46 win over No. 1 South Carolina Thursday. (NC State Women's Basketball)

Senior forward Kayla Jones led the team with 16 points and 12 rebounds. On a night when the Wolfpack shot 4 of 17 from the perimeter, Jones went 2-of-2 on three-point attempts.

One of them came during the biggest moment of the night, when Jones sank a triple from the top of the key with 27 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter to give the Pack a 51-46 lead.

Jones then made another big play on the defensive end when she drew a charge from South Carolina's Lele Grissett with 16 seconds remaining. The play gave the Wolfpack possession with a five-point lead in the final seconds of the game.

"It was huge," Jones said. "When I shot it, I could see my teammates cheering. Then when I came down and got to charge, I really went crazy then. I thought that kind of sealed the game, so I was very excited."

Junior center Elissa Cunane was fouled with 11 seconds to go and made both of her free throws to stretch the Pack's lead to seven, effectively icing the game.

Cunane struggled early, scoring just two points on 0-of-7 shooting in the first half. The "Big Smile" surfaced in the second half, however, finishing the contest with 14 points, six rebounds and four blocks.

Sophomore guard Jakia Brown-Turner was the second Wolfpack player to have a double-double in the upset victory. She scored 12 points and reeled in 11 rebounds.

Fifth-year senior guard Raina Perez, who transferred to NC State in the offseason from Cal State Fullerton after winning Big West Player of the Year honors last season, provided a stable option for the Wolfpack at point guard all night.

Perez finished with 11 points, four assists, one steal and no turnovers.

All five of the Pack's starters played at least 35 minutes Thursday night.

Part of that was due to the absence of sophomore forward Jada Boyd, who had started the first two contests but missed the game due to an injury that was announced just hours before tipoff.

Coach Wes Moore quotes

Opening statement

"I couldn't be prouder of a team, a group of girls. We didn't shoot the ball very well, which we normally do. We really struggled. You got to give South Carolina a lot of credit for that and their defense. I'm just so proud of the way we battled.

"We lost Jada Boyd this week for I don't know how long, and we really came down here kind of short handed, as far as experience goes. I played them a lot of minutes, and hopefully we can bring our freshmen along. I got confidence in them, but in a game like this, we needed to go with our veterans. They were probably hurting and everything else but just probably the way they battled.

"Aliyah Boston, I have so much respect for her. Such a great player. I thought we did a nice job of trying to help on her and keep it out of there as much as we could. We did a pretty good job on the boards. They're going to get offensive rebounds, and they did, a bunch of them.

"I'm proud of the effort we gave, and it's good you know good win for our program, obviously."

On putting the game in perspective of the season

"We're enjoying it tonight, obviously. It's a big win, it makes the trip home a whole lot nicer. But it's early in the year. It's a great win for us, don't get me wrong, I have so much respect for Dawn Staley. What I've admired about her is she did it at Temple and then she came here to a place that women's basketball had not been real successful. I have all kinds of respect for her and this program.

"We're going to enjoy it for 24, maybe 48 hours and then we got another game on Sunday and we're going to have to bounce back. Bill Parcells used to talk about big game, next game. We're going to have to make sure we're ready to play on on Sunday, but we're going to enjoy this one for 24 hours or so anyway."

On winning a low-scoring affair after struggling on defense in the first two games:

"Normally we talk about trying to hold the team to 60 points, 30 points a half. If we had done that tonight, we would have gotten beat and they would hae thought, 'Coach, you're crazy.'

"I think we were one for 13 at one time from three, so that means we hit three out of our last four. I guess we hit them when we had to. Yes, our defense has not been good. Our on the ball defense, our pick on the ball defense.

"Tonight, we stepped up in a big game and did a great job, for the most part, keeping them in front of us. That's a big challenge with this South Carolina team that's so athletic, so aggressive, while also concentrating on trying to keep the ball out of the paint.

"I'm proud of it because like I said, I've been the worst critic of our defense so far this year so it's great. That's what they were saying we got in there in the locker room, 'We played defense!' Yeah, we did. So, now, can we keep it going?"