CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — It’s been a rough month for the NC State women’s basketball team.
Back-to-back home losses and a blowout suffered at the hands of Florida State were bad enough, but perhaps the lowest point of all the Pack’s struggles was the team’s 56-47 loss to rival North Carolina on Sunday in Chapel Hill.
It was the furthest thing from a pretty game. The No. 11 Wolfpack (13-5, 3-4 ACC) led a poor-shooting contest 32-31 after three quarters, but the No. 22 Tar Heels (12-5, 3-3 ACC) played like world-beaters in the fourth, outscoring NC State 25-15 in the final frame and riding their home-crowd advantage to victory.
“I’d say it’s a step in the right direction defensively — we gave up 91 points Thursday night,” said head coach Wes Moore. “We didn’t knock down a whole lot of shots. We were probably settling. We looked poor against the zone — as a coach, I’ve gotta do a better job trying to get us better looks in that situation.”
This is uncharted territory for NC State. Not since the 2019-20 season has the Pack lost back-to-back games, and with its fourth loss in the last six contests, this team looks like a far cry from the championship-winning squads of the last three years.
NC State didn’t shoot well at all in the first half, but neither did the Heels as the teams combined for a 25.4% clip in the first 20 minutes. UNC held a slim 21-19 lead at the break, but the Pack came out with an 8-2 run to start the second half and went up by one heading into the final stretch.
That’s when the Heels turned it on and the crowd inside Carmichael Arena came alive. After NC State took a 34-31 advantage, UNC went on an 8-0 run to retake the lead and never looked back.
The turning point was when UNC guard Kennedy Todd-Williams stole the ball from NC State’s senior wing Jakia Brown-Turner, then went down the court and drew a foul as she laid the ball in the basket for an and-1, putting the Heels on top and sending the crowd to its feet.
Todd-Williams finished with a game-high 15 points, but she wasn’t the Heels’ only star as Destiny Adams hit a pair of back-breaking corner 3s near the end, which ultimately proved to be the dagger.
“We’ve got to learn how to finish,” Brown-Turner said. “It’s a little bit of growing pains right now, but we’re learning, we’re improving on our defense, and I think that’s the main thing.”
The Heels were the tougher, more physical team. The epitome of that was the play of UNC’s Alyssa Ustby, who pulled in an outrageous 18 rebounds and simply wanted it more than any player for NC State.
Brown-Turner led the Pack with 14 points, while senior center Camille Hobby was close behind with 13. You can’t say NC State didn’t have a chance, but the Heels were able to score and get stops at the end, and the Pack was not.
This is a rough stretch the Pack is going through, but the team has to be careful not to let this string of losses turn into many more.
“Basketball is a hard sport,” Hobby said. “You have so many games. If you dwell on one — you can’t do that. It’s a tough loss; we’re gonna look at the film, get better from it, but there’s no point in dwelling on it.”
NC State now returns to the comfortable confines of Reynolds Coliseum when it hosts Miami on Thursday, Jan. 19 at 6 p.m. before another nationally televised road contest against Louisville on Sunday, Jan. 22 at 1 p.m.
