The No. 17 women’s basketball team out-played the previously unbeaten Radford Highlanders by a score of 75-58 on Sunday afternoon in Reynolds Coliseum, behind 23 points from freshman center Elissa Cunane.
The Wolfpack (4-0) used the height of Cunane and the playmaking ability of graduate guard Kiara Leslie to stay poised in the face of adversity. The Wolfpack went up by 13 at one point before letting Radford (2-1) back in to tie the game. The experience of Leslie, and junior guard Aislinn Konig and redshirt junior guard Grace Hunter were keys to the Wolfpack staying focus.
“I think all three of those guards, Aislinn, Kiara [and] Grace,” head coach Wes Moore said. “They all have a lot of confidence and they probably didn’t waver a whole lot there. We are kind of young inside, so those players were struggling a little bit.”
The Pack came out slow, taking almost two and a half minutes to get on the scoreboard. Radford meanwhile took advantage to get out to a 7-2 lead, using their strong finishing inside to take advantage of the Pack in the paint. Moore subbed in the 6-foot-5 Cunane to counter the Highlanders and she provided some much-needed defense down low.
Cunane’s impact was immediate, with her coming in and getting an assist, scoring a bucket and forcing a turnover with her defense. The Pack continued going to her in the quarter as she finished with five points and had a much bigger impact than the box score shows.
“It felt good, I was making my free throws which was very satisfying to me, because I’ve been off on those a bit and just my guards feeding me,” Cunane said. “It felt really good that they were able to feed me, because they were closing out on them so much.”
Radford cooled down after Cunane checked in, shooting just 36 percent from the field, but finding themselves only down 14-12.
The second quarter saw Cunane continue her dominance, going head-to-head against the Highlanders best player, Savannah Felgemacher, who finished with 15 rebounds. The two traded buckets on multiple possessions, with Cunane pouring in five more points before being subbed out due to picking up her second foul.
Then, the Highlanders got hot from beyond the arc, hitting back-to-back 3’s to take a 24-19 lead. Before halftime, the Pack used a balanced scoring attack that saw five different players score to come back and retake the lead 31-25.
Hunter and Leslie were key factors in the Wolfpack’s ability to stay in the game during the first half. Hunter grabbed five rebounds and dished out three assists while Leslie scored seven points and dominated the paint with eight boards.
The Wolfpack came out of the gates strong in the third quarter getting a variety of buckets including a Konig 3-pointer that extended her streak of consecutive games with a 3-pointer to 37. This gave the Pack a nice cushion at 38-25, but Radford wasn’t going to give up so easily and went on a 10-0 run to bring them within three at 38-35.
Cunane checked back in to provide the Pack some much-needed scoring and got to work straight away, getting to the line and bullying the Highlanders under the basket. She recorded eight points, going a perfect 6-of-6 from the line in the quarter.
“The third quarter we let them make a run and get back in it,” Moore said. “But we got Cunane back in there and made them match up with us. Thought she did a great job.”
Konig heated up as well, hitting three 3-pointers in the third, and finishing with 14 points on 4-of-7 shooting from distance.
The Pack was only up eight at the beginning of the fourth quarter, but the combination of Cunane and Leslie was too much for Radford as NC State was able to go on a 14-2 run capped by a Konig 3-pointer that gave the Wolfpack a 20-point lead.
“Elissa Cunane just put on a show obviously in the second half,” Moore said. “I’m really proud of what she was able to accomplish, but it’s going to get a lot tougher now. We’re going to have to put together a full 40 minutes to compete at the level we want to.”
The Wolfpack will be heading to Mexico for the Cancun Challenge to face off against Michigan State and George Washington.
“We are going to have to play a lot better,” Moore said. “Now you’re playing someone from a Power Five conference that is picked to finish pretty near the top, so I think it’ll be a pretty big challenge for us, first time on the road, without our fans. We’re going to have to be creating our own energy.”
