Duke women’s basketball downs Iona in first round of NCAA Tournament, faces Colorado next

Duke may be new to the NCAA Tournament under women’s basketball coach Kara Lawson, but Saturday night against Iona in the first round it played like older siblings toying with their little sisters.

The third-seeded Blue Devils never trailed and raced to an 89-49 victory over the No. 14 seed Gaels in the Seattle 4 Region. They advanced to meet No. 6 seed Colorado, which beat Middle Tennessee State 82-60, on Monday in Cameron Indoor Stadium.

“There was a preparedness about them, a respect for the opponent about them and I thought all all of our players that played tonight, were really locked into what we were trying to do,” Lawson said. “That’s what you hope for as a coach in March, you hope that your team is locked in.”

Duke (26-6) showed the kind of offensive firepower it has rarely displayed all season. The game marked just the third time all year it scored more than 80 points and it’s the first time since a 100-49 victory at Richmond on Dec. 4. And it all started by jumping out with an 8-0 spurt to start the game, which Iona coach Billi Chambers admitted “shell shocked” her team and left them “a little startled.”

Duke’s Celeste Taylor and Elizabeth Balogun led four players in double figures, scoring with 13 each, combining to shoot 10-for-14 from the field and make four 3-pointers. As a team, the Blue Devils shot 58.5 percent from the field and showed no signs of having any of the struggles that plagued their 58-37 loss to Virginia Tech in the ACC title game.

The four-year absence from the NCAA Tournament and two-week break in schedule from their paltry 37-point performance in Greensboro seemed well behind the Blue Devils on Saturday. They were the more talented team and showed why.

“They were quicker to the ball, they were more athletic, they were a lot more explosive,” Chambers said. “They were getting some of the looks that, maybe they were getting in the non-conference because they had us in that regard.”

When they did miss, they overpowered the Gaels (26-7) on the boards with a 44-14 rebounding advantage. Duke turned 18 offensive rebounds into a season-high 25 second chance points.

“Coach always believes in us, she always told us throughout the whole year that we’re confident team when we score on offense,” said Duke’s Jordyn Oliver, who scored 10 points on 4-for-4 shooting from off the bench. “She always tells us how we’re a great team in March so we’re just keep going and going and practicing it and it showed today.”

It didn’t help Iona’s upset formula when point guard Juana Camilion, who was the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Player of the Year, picked up her second foul just six minutes into the game. When she left the game, the Gaels trailed 10-6. By the time she re-entered with 8:27 left in the second quarter, their deficit ballooned to 16 points.

Part of Duke’s run was sparked by its full court pressure. Iona seemed disoriented without Camilion on the floor to direct its press break. The Blue Devils full court pressure began to overwhelm Iona, forcing 13 turnovers in the first half, which led to 24 points.

“I didn’t think we got into a great offensive rhythm, but that’s a credit to them,” Chambers said. “They’re a phenomenal defensive team. They obviously scouted very well, they kept us off the 3-point line and made it really difficult for us to score the ball.”

Taylor suffocated Camilion when she was in the game. Camilion averaged 14.2 points, but didn’t make her second basket until 8:38 in the third quarter. Although she finished with 12 points, most of them came once the Blue Devils had firmly put the game out of reach.

Iona entered the game ranking second nationally in 3-point percentage, making 40.1 percent of the 19.1 3-point attempts it took per game. Those shots didn’t come so easily against the Blue Devils, who held the Gaels to just 2-for-11 from behind the arc for the game. The two made 3s tied a season-low for Iona, which went 2-for-16 in a loss at St. John’s in December.

“We knew coming in that they’re a good 3-point shooting team,” Oliver said. “And we knew that we were gonna have to live with their 3-point attempts so we could win the game and so we just kept working on that.”