In their second meeting during the ACC-Big Ten challenge, and only third meeting overall, the No. 13 NC State women’s basketball team held off Michigan 66-55 in Reynolds Coliseum Thursday night.
Led by the aggressive play of redshirt junior guard Grace Hunter, the Wolfpack (7-0) attacked the basket throughout the game, drawing fouls on the Wolverines (5-2) and getting high-percentage shots near the hoop.
“We knew they had a few defenders that weren’t as fast as us,” senior Kiara Leslie said. “Coach just told us to keep attacking them and keep going to the basket strong.”
The Wolfpack finished 17 of 22 from the free-throw line, with Hunter going a perfect 11 for 11. Freshman center Elissa Cunane joined in on the perfect free-throw shooting, hitting 3 of 3 from the stripe, while establishing a huge presence in the paint.
The 6-foot-5 North Carolina native was also tasked with guarding Wolverines’ center Hallie Thome, who was on the Wade Trophy Award Watch List for the best player in college basketball. Cunane put up one of her best defensive performances holding Thome to just seven points, nine under her average.
“We knew she was good and left-handed,” Cunane said. “So I just tried to sit on her right shoulder and hit her early when she came down the court and not let her bury me too deep.”
Both teams started off slow, and were a combined 4 for 20 from the field at the first media timeout. But the short breather helped, as the teams increased their scoring outputs and finished shooting over 30 percent for the quarter.
“We’ve been shooting the ball pretty well,” head coach Wes Moore said. “But we kept preaching there’s gonna be a night we don’t shoot well and we’re going to have to defend and we’re going to have to rebound.”
Cunane checked in after the media timeout and got to work quickly, scoring four points in less than one minute, while also forcing a turnover on the defensive end. The Wolverines held a 16-13 lead at the end of the quarter, but it didn’t last long.
The Wolfpack came out much more aggressive in the second, attacking the basket immediately as Leslie scored on a beautiful Euro-step layup, followed by Hunter drawing back-to-back fouls to give the Pack a one-point lead.
It would be the last lead of the quarter for the Pack as the Wolverines caught fire from beyond the arc hitting 4 of 5 3-pointers in the quarter to finish leading 32-29 at half.
The third quarter started off poorly for the Pack, as the team found itself down seven just three minutes in. The Wolverines’ Nicole Munger was a perfect 6 of 6 at the time and 4 for 4 from distance, but junior guard Aislinn Konig was not phased. She hit two 3-pointers of her own to totally change the momentum into the Wolfpack’s favor, while shutting down Munger for the rest of the quarter.
“I thought [Konig] did a great job on Munger in the second half,” Moore said. “Obviously, Munger was 5 for 5 and 4 for 4 from 3 in the first half. Because [Konig] has to get open so much herself at the 3-point line, I think she has a pretty good idea of anticipating what the shooter is going to try to do next.”
The second 3-pointer started a 14-2 run for the Pack to finish out the quarter. The run saw four different players score and seven free throws hit to give the Wolfpack a 50-44 lead heading into the final quarter.
The Wolverines cut the lead to just five in the fourth quarter, but a technical foul on the Michigan bench put a hamper on their comeback efforts. The foul occurred with the Wolverines down 58-53 with 3:42 left and resulted in two made free throws by Hunter to give the Pack the cushion it needed to pull out the victory.
The Wolfpack will be back for its second game of a three-game homestand on Dec. 2 as it faces Old Dominion at 2 p.m. in Reynolds Coliseum.
Redshirt junior guard Grace Hunter celebrates the win over Michigan in the ACC-Big Ten Challenge with her teammates on Thursday, Nov. 29 at Reynolds Coliseum. Hunter scored a game-high 19 points along with eight rebounds and four steals as the Wolfpack won 66-55.
