Women's basketball tops Duke, 63-61, with Thomas' block

Standing all alone in front of the Duke bench, Haley Peters held the outcome of the game in her hands.

Her Blue Devils trailing the Terrapins women's basketball team by two points, the final seconds ticking off the clock, the forward hoisted a 3-point attempt from the left wing that would decide who would win and lose.

Alyssa Thomas had no intention of leaving it up to chance, however.

Not even a second after the ball left Peters' fingertips, Thomas was in its way. With one ferocious swing, the forward swatted the ball off course, sending what could've been the game-winner careening over two rows of seats behind the basket and erasing any chance Duke might have had at a victory.

In front of a season-high crowd of more than 15,000 at Comcast Center, Thomas' late-game denial was the difference as the No. 8 Terps handed the No. 5 Blue Devils their first loss in ACC play this season, 63-61.

"She did a phenomenal job of sticking with it, using her length for a late-game block," coach Brenda Frese said. "I told the team in the locker room, this one was special for a lot of different reasons."

Frese hadn't wanted to give Duke (22-4, 13-1 ACC) a chance in the final seconds. After the Blue Devils' Chelsea Gray drove into the lane and banked in a layup to tie the game at 61 with 21 seconds left, Duke called a timeout and Frese set up what she hoped would be the final shot.

But Thomas' aggressiveness got the best of her. After a lobbed ball put her past Duke's full-court press, the forward put her head down and barreled into the lane, missing a contested layup with 15 seconds still on the game clock. Thomas finished the afternoon with a game-high 12 rebounds but scored just eight points on 2-for-11 shooting from the field.

"We wanted to hold for the last shot," Frese said. "But when you get somebody on the side of you, defensively, at home, you go make a play."

As she had all game, Tianna Hawkins cleaned up the mess. The forward grabbed her game-high ninth offensive rebound of the game and sunk the putback, putting the Terps up by two with 14 seconds to play.

"Coach challenged us and was like, ‘We need to go to the boards,'" said Hawkins, who finished with a team-high 19 points. "So my main focus was making sure I got on the boards."

Thomas didn't wait long to atone for her earlier miss. After the Terps' (23-4, 10-4 ACC) defense collapsed on a driving Gray, Peters and guard Shay Selby were left wide open beyond the arc. As Gray swung the ball toward Peters on the opposite side of the court, Thomas was the only defender in position to make a play.

"We initially thought it was Chelsea Gray who was going to try to go to the rim, so we were doing everything in our power to make sure she didn't," Thomas said. "I saw that the ball was kicked out to Selby and [Peters] was wide open. I kind of just busted it out there, I was sprinting, jumped up and luckily I got my hand on the ball."

Clutch 3-pointers from guards Brene Moseley and Laurin Mincy keyed the Terps' eventual late-game surge. After the team missed 10 of its first 12 attempts from beyond the arc, Moseley and Mincy combined to make three in a span of two-plus minutes, turning a tied game at the six-minute mark into a four-point lead with 3:36 to play.

Mincy scored 17 points on 5-for-12 shooting — including a 50-percent clip from beyond the arc — and Moseley added seven points and six assists playing in place of the foul-plagued Anjale Barrett.

"I just heard the bench, because we were on offense down there, saying, ‘Keep shooting, keep shooting,'" Mincy said. "Fortunately, I was able to hit the next two shots."

Yesterday's win came just two days after Frese notched her 300th career victory, a 73-56 win over Virginia Thursday night. But after watching her star forward swat the ACC's top team out of the building in front of the eighth-largest crowd in school and conference history, Frese had little trouble deciding which was sweeter.

"That would be a no-brainer," Frese said. "There's nothing better than beating Duke."

vitale@umdbk.com