GREENSBORO — For the first time since 1991, the NC State women’s basketball team won the ACC Tournament. It took everyone giving everything they had to get the 71-66 win over Florida State, and despite their youth, freshmen wing Jakia Brown-Turner and forward Jada Boyd came up huge for the Wolfpack.
The Wolfpack got plenty of production from its usual stars, as senior guard Aislinn Konig and sophomore center Elissa Cunane each scored 18, but for large stretches and in some of the most crucial moments in the game, head coach Wes Moore’s youngest guns got it done.
“It is really exciting,” Moore said. “Both of them are ACC All-Freshman team members. Jada Boyd just brings so much energy when she comes out there, so athletic, makes plays for us. Jakia, what a day she had today; definitely didn’t play like a freshman. She didn’t play like a freshman this whole tournament. It’s really awesome to see somebody step up like that in this environment their first year.”
The duo of five-star recruits combined for 24 points, as each scored in double digits, and Brown-Turner earned her first career double-double, one she will never forget.
“Just going out there, playing hard for my team, for coach, that is how I ended up playing like that,” Brown-Turner said.
Brown-Turner’s 10th and final rebound was the most important, as with the game on the line and the Pack leading by just one, she rose above Florida State’s star forward Kiah Gillespie to snag a rebound off a missed free throw. Brown-Turner was fouled on the play and sunk both her free throws, the second of which put the Pack up 67-63, a lead it would ride to the final whistle.
“I just knew there was a chance of my teammate missing or making it, so I just crashed the board,” Brown-Turner said. “I got it, pulled it back out and tried to get it back up as quickly as I could.”
The pair of free throws were Brown-Turner’s only points in the second half, as she grabbed 12 in the first half. The wing was the Pack’s lone bright spot in the first half, as she shot 5 for 8 from the field while the rest of the team shot 5 for 15.
As the rest of the team picked up its shooting, Brown-Turner turned to the boards for her production, grabbing eight rebounds in the second half.
While Brown-Turner cooled down on the scoring front, Boyd heated up. Boyd put up four in the second quarter and six in the second half, but while she didn’t score in the volume of the Pack’s big stars, Boyd’s baskets gave the Pack crucial momentum.
The most memorable of Boyd’s morale-boosting baskets came in the third quarter, where she posted up on Gillespie and screamed for the ball. The freshman yelled loudly enough that her “give it!” could be heard from the sideline. Boyd collected the pass and turned Gillespie inside out before coolly laying it in.
“[Gillespie] is a great player,” Boyd said. “Playing against her is very difficult. She has a great shot. I just kind of went in there and played hard … I’m just doing whatever I had to do to get team the W. They trust me with the ball, so I’m going to try and deliver.”
The two freshmen came up big when it mattered and performed on the big stage against strong players. With three more years under Moore ahead of them and two more with Cunane at their side, NC State’s core of young players looks to have a lot of winning ahead of it.
“Really exciting to think you have these two freshmen, and you got Elissa sitting over here, who’s a sophomore; that’s a pretty good nucleus,” Moore said. “We’re graduating a lot of guards, so we have some work to do there, but it’s exciting to think about having such a good core back.”
Freshman forward Jada Boyd and junior forward Kayla Jones celebrate after the team won the 2020 ACC Women's Tournament against the Florida State Seminoles on Sunday, March 8, 2020 in the Greensboro Coliseum. This is the Wolfpack's first ACC tournament victory since 1991.
