Wolfpack women clinch third-straight Sweet Sixteen appearance

Top-seeded NC State defeated eighth-seeded South Florida 79-67 Tuesday in the second round of the 2021 NCAA Women's Basketball Tournament.

The Wolfpack advanced to its third-straight Sweet Sixteen appearance, a streak that now ties the program record. The Pack will face the winner of Wednesday's second-round matchup between fourth-seeded Indiana and 12th-seeded Belmont.

NC State found itself down 36-35 at halftime after South Florida was able to make 6-of-14 three-point attempts, finishing the first half with a 42.9 percent shooting average from beyond the arc.

The Wolfpack jumped out to a 12-4 run to start the second half and proceeded to outscore the Bulls 24-11 in the decisive third quarter to take a 59-47 lead into the fourth.

"I wouldn't say I really got into them," NC State head coach Wes Moore said about his halftime speech. "We stressed that we had to do a better job on the boards. South Florida's a great offensive rebounding team, and in the second half we got hurt even more. We've got to do a better job than that.

"Rebounding is what wins championships, so you give a team like South Florida a second or third look at a three, they're going to knock it down."

Although South Florida outrebounded the Wolfpack 12-7 on the offensive glass and outscored it 11-6 on second-chance opportunities, NC State outrebounded the Bulls in total 38-35 and 31-23 on the defensive end.

The Pack was without its third-leading scorer and second-leading rebounder, senior forward Kayla Jones, a first-team All-ACC selection by the league's coaches, who is nursing a patella tendon injury that ended up sidelining her Tuesday.

While she was able to sit on the bench to cheer on her teammates, her status for the remainder of the tournament is still unknown.

"Kayla Jones is our Swiss Army knife," Moore said. "She does everything well. She helps us handle the ball in the full court, rebounds, even pushes it some in transition, can shoot the three, so we really miss her.

"I don't know when she might be back. We're fortunate we were able to get through today without her. A lot of it's going to depend on the pain and how intense it is. It's a patella tendon injury, so hopefully she'll improve in the next few days and we can get her back out there."

In her absence, the rest of the Wolfpack stepped up. All five of its starters finished in double figures.

Sophomore wing Jakia Brown-Turner led the team with 19 points on 7-of-12 shooting, including a 2-of-4 mark on three-point attempts. She also had four rebounds and two assists.

"Jakia has not been shooting as well as she normally can, so I just kept reminding her, 'You've done it all your life. You've been a great shooter all of your life,'" Moore said. "She was getting where she was passing up threes and looking to attack, but we need her to knock down threes because that creates spacing for our offense.

"We needed to get Jakia going, and it was good to see her hit two out of four today. We need that to have some balance in our offense, so that was a big lift for us."

Sophomore forward Jada Boyd, who was the ACC Sixth Player of the Year but started in the absence of Jones, had her fifth double-double this season, producing 18 points on 6-of-11 shooting and 10 rebounds.

"Jada is just so explosive and athletic," Moore said. "She creates some matchup problems for people. She had a double-double, as did Elissa [Cunane]. When you got a forward and a post that are doing those kinds of things, it takes a little bit of pressure off your guards, and maybe that's why the guards shot the ball well today.

"We definitely wanted to get it inside. South Florida has shown a tendency to double the post from the weak side, so we spent quite a bit of time trying to prepare for that as best you can. Sometimes you get in a hurry, and against that double team, you can't do it.

"We're very blessed and fortunate to have Jada Boyd. I've said all year long, we've got six starters. With Kayla Jones out, Jada Boyd steps right in. It does hurt us a little bit depth-wise, but I can't think of anyone I'd rather have coming in and filling in like that than Jada Boyd."

Fifth-year senior guard Raina Perez hit some tough shots, yet again, for the Pack, including a contested three from way beyond the arc with the shot clock expiring in the final minute of the second quarter, which ultimately kept it a one-possession game at the break.

She finished with 12 points, four assists, two steals and two rebounds.

Senior guard Kai Crutchfield once again lived up to her nickname, Kai "Clutchfield," claiming 12 points that included a perfect 3 of 3 mark from the perimeter. She also had a team-high six assists. Crutchfield is now 6 of 7 on three-point attempts through the first two rounds of the NCAA Tournament.

"A few weeks ago she had a hand injury on her shooting hand, had it all taped up, so offensively she was struggling some," Moore said. "But she still did an unbelievable job defensively for us. She's that person we try to have matched up with the other team's best scorer and for the most part, she's done a good job with that. It's good to see her make three threes, have six assists and just one turnover.

"She did a lot of things well for us. The Swiss Army knife comparison or the Jack of all trades, Kai's doing that for us at a good time of year."

Cunane, NC State's All-American junior center, was kept in check offensively for a good chunk of the afternoon with some physical defense from South Florida, but she still finished with a double-double.

The 6-5, two-time first-team All-ACC selection had 12 points on 3-of-15 shooting but reeled in a team-high 11 rebounds while adding three assists and one block.

"It's important for us just to make sure she gets touches and get shots," Moore said. "Fifteen shots? I'd be thrilled with that pretty much every game, get her in that range. She normally shoots about 60 percent from the field. I go to Vegas every August for a week, and I know you want to play the odds. Elissa has pretty good odds when you're shooting 60 percent.

"They were very physical with her, tried to bang her, tried to double her some, and that made it tough. She's just got to slow down and make sure she's seeing the help. She's doing so much better at that though, three assists and one turnover today."

Freshman guard Genesis Bryant, sophomore center Camille Hobby and redshirt freshman forward Elle Sutphin played a combined 21 minutes off of the bench.

Sutphin, who hadn't played more than 10 minutes in conference play this season, scored four points and grabbed one offensive rebound in six minutes on the floor. She went 2-of-2 from the field and made her first basket since Jan. 3 in the Pack's 76-57 home win over Boston College.

13 Is the margin of points NC State outscored South Florida in the third quarter. The Wolfpack outscored the Bulls 24-11 during that 10-minute stretch and also outpaced North Carolina A&T 20-7 in the third quarter of its first-round win. The Pack has now outscored its opponents 44-18 in combined third quarters through the first two rounds of the tournament.

18 Points per game is Boyd's scoring average in the 2021 NCAA Tournament. The 6-2 forward scored 13 or more points just five times during the regular season but has since done so three times through five postseason contests.

21.4 Percent was South Florida's three-point shooting average on 14 attempts in the second half, in which it was outscored 44-31. The Bulls took a one-point lead into halftime after shooting 42.9 percent on 14 attempts from beyond the arc in the first half.

2 South Florida starters fouled out in the contest. Most notably forward Bethy Mununga, who is the second-leading rebounder in Division I and entered the game averaging a double-double. Mununga picked up her fifth foul with 3:02 remaining in the third quarter, and forward Shae Leverett fouled out late in the fourth.

The Wolfpack advance to the Sweet Sixteen on Saturday, March 27 or the following day at a time and with a television broadcast to be decided.

NC State will face the winner of the second-round matchup between fourth-seeded Indiana and 12th-seeded Belmont, which tips off Wednesday, March 24 at 5 p.m.

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