Boston College Women’s Basketball Upsets #10 NC State

The Boston College women’s basketball team played their second straight game against a top 10 team tonight, facing #9/10 NC State. BC played a great game on both offense and defense, shooting 45% from the floor despite a high pressure NC State defense and grabbing 42 rebounds, and the Eagles pulled off their first win over a top 10 team since 2010 by winning this one 79-71.

The Eagles won the tip-off and took an early 2-0 lead, but NC State quickly went up 10-5. A pair of 3s from Jojo Lacey helped BC catch up, and at the first media timeout the game was tied up at 13. The teams traded leads for the remainder of the first period, with NC State taking a 21-19 lead into the second quarter after a last second bucket.

NC State came out hot in the second quarter, building up a 29-19 lead early. However, Taina Mair came through with another pair of 3s to help BC get back into the game, cutting NC State’s lead to 29-27 with about 4 minutes to go in the half. The teams went back to trading baskets from there, and at halftime were tied at 35. Dontavia Waggoner led BC with 10 points and 6 rebounds at the half.

The Eagles scored on 3 straight plays to go up 41-35 to start the third, and continued to dominated scoring as the quarter went on. The Eagles went up 50-43 after Mair was fouled on a 3 point attempt, and led 50-43 at the media timeout. NC State went on a scoring run late in the period, but BC kept the lead and was up 57-52 heading into the fourth quarter.

The fourth quarter saw the teams resume back and forth scoring, as NC State got within a single point early and spent much of the first 5 minutes down just 1 or 2 points. and at the timeout with 4:50 to go BC led 66-64. Another Jojo Lacey 3 with just a couple minutes to go helped BC take a 76-69 lead, and foul shots helped the Eags build that up to a 79-69 lead with just 29.3 seconds to go. NC State grabbed one more basket before the buzzer sounded, but this one ended with a 79-71 BC victory.

Dontavia Waggoner was the standout against her former team, leading all players with 23 points and adding 10 rebounds for the double-double. Andrea Daley led all players with 11 boards, and Taina Mair grabbed a double-double with 15 points and 10 assists.