The 2025 NCAA Girls’s Match continued Friday with the primary day of Candy 16 motion.
[Read more: 2025 Women’s March Madness Schedule: Dates, locations, channels, how to watch]
Duke began the day with a classic defensive efficiency, because the second-seeded Blue Devils stifled third-seeded North Carolina. After that, No. 1 seed South Carolina continued its title protection because the Gamecocks got here again to carry off upset-minded Maryland.
Third-seeded Louisiana State can be off to its third straight Elite Eight look after going by No. 2 seed North Carolina State to get there.
The highest seed within the NCAA girls’s match, UCLA, regarded the half on Friday night time. The Bruins had little hassle with No. 5 seed Ole Miss.
Listed here are all the largest moments from Day 1 Candy 16:
Lauren Betts was so dominant inside that she barely missed, scoring 31 factors on 15-of-16 capturing to steer UCLA previous Mississippi 76-62 on Friday night time and sending the Bruins to the Elite Eight of the ladies’s NCAA Match for the primary time since 2018.
The 6-foot-7 Betts added 10 rebounds and three blocks for the No. 1 total seed, which can face LSU on Sunday for an opportunity to advance to the Closing 4.
Kiki Rice added 13 factors and 7 assists and was the one different participant in double figures for the Bruins (32-2).
Tameiya Sadler scored 14 factors for the fifth-seeded Rebels (22-10), who had reached the Elite Eight 5 occasions, however not since 2007.
Betts had an analogous line — 30 factors and 14 rebounds — within the Bruins’ second-round 84-67 victory over Richmond.
Betts’ layup put the Bruins forward 19-10 within the opening quarter, however Ole Miss closed inside 21-19 on KK Deans‘ jumper.
Deans’ fast-break layup on the finish of the primary half acquired the Rebels inside 30-29 on the break.
The Bruins opened the second half with an 8-0 run and went up 45-33 on Londynn Jones‘ 3-pointer.
Gabriela Jaquez was on their own on a fast-break layup that put UCLA up 63-46 within the ultimate quarter, and Ole Miss by no means threatened after that.
UCLA’s solely two losses this season got here in opposition to JuJu Watkins and Southern California earlier than the Bruins acquired their revenge within the Huge Ten Match ultimate, beating USC 72-67.
Betts scored 16 of UCLA’s 30 first-half factors, the second time this season that she’s scored greater than half of the Bruins’ factors in a half.
She has 93 blocks this season, averaging practically three a recreation, and was named the Huge Ten’s Defensive Participant of the 12 months.
LSU comes again to high NC State in thriller, strikes on to a different Elite Eight
Aneesah Morrow had 30 factors and 19 rebounds, Kailyn Gilbert had a important block that arrange Mikaylah Williams‘ go-ahead layup with 1:07 remaining, and No. 3 seed LSU rallied previous second-seeded NC State 80-73 in a tense girls’s NCAA Match regional semifinal on Friday.
The Wolfpack led 69-64 with 4:29 left earlier than LSU started to surge, led by Williams, who scored 10 factors within the fourth quarter. After Gilbert blocked a layup try by NC State’s Zoe Brooks, Williams transformed on the opposite finish to make it 74-73 — a part of a game-closing 10-0 run for the Tigers (31-5).
LSU, which received the nationwide title two years in the past for coach Kim Mulkey, reached the Elite Eight for the third consecutive season and can face top-seeded UCLA.
Sa’Myah Smith had 21 factors and 11 rebounds for LSU, and Williams completed with 17 factors and eight boards.
Brooks led NC State (28-7) with 21 factors. Coach Wes Moore’s Wolfpack fell brief of their bid to succeed in a second straight Closing 4.
The sport featured seven lead modifications and 4 ties, and LSU’s 21-10 benefit within the first quarter was the largest lead for both staff. Morrow had 10 factors within the first interval.
NC State surged again forward to take a 40-36 halftime lead, and Morrow once more dominated within the third quarter, scoring 11 of her staff’s 21 factors within the interval to place LSU forward 57-53.
NC State opened the fourth quarter with an 8-1 run. The Wolfpack held LSU with no subject objective till Morrow made a layup with simply over seven minutes to play.
Morrow, the nation’s high rebounder, had her thirtieth double-double of the season. Her effort on the boards helped the Tigers outrebound the Wolfpack 52-36, together with an 18-10 benefit on the offensive glass.
The 6-foot-1 ahead is one in all two girls in NCAA historical past with greater than 100 double-doubles. She’s additionally the one participant within the nation with greater than 600 factors and 450 rebounds this season.
South Carolina survives scare from Maryland to advance to fifth straight Elite Eight
MiLaysia Fulwiley scored 23 factors, together with a go-ahead layup with 2:22 left, and Chloe Kitts added 15 factors and 11 rebounds to assist No. 1 seed South Carolina beat fourth-seeded Maryland 71-67 on Friday within the Candy 16 of the ladies’s NCAA Match.
The defending nationwide champion Gamecocks went back-and-forth with the Terrapins all recreation earlier than lastly doing sufficient within the ultimate couple of minutes to place it away.
South Carolina will face Duke within the Elite Eight on Sunday. The Blue Devils beat Atlantic Coast Convention rival North Carolina 47-38 earlier Friday.
Daybreak Staley’s staff trailed 60-59 with 3:25 left earlier than holding Maryland with no level over the following three minutes. Fulwiley’s layup started the 7-0 run that gave the Gamecocks (33-3) simply sufficient of a cushion.
Kitts added three free throws through the spurt and Fulwiley scored on a coast-to-coast drive.
The Gamecocks had been up 66-60 with 25 seconds left when Saylor Poffenbarger ended Maryland’s scoring drought with a 3-pointer.
However the Terps could not get nearer because the Gamecocks made 5 of six free throws down the stretch, together with two by Fulwiley with 10.9 seconds left that made it 71-65.
Kaylene Smikle scored 17 factors to steer Maryland (25-8) earlier than fouling out.
Neither staff might get into an offensive movement within the first three quarters. South Carolina trailed 43-39 late within the third earlier than closing out the interval with a 13-7 run that was capped by a spectacular transition basket by Fulwiley, who went behind her again after which hit a pull-up shot.
The 2 groups had met as soon as beforehand within the NCAA Match, an 86-75 win for South Carolina within the Elite Eight in 2023.
South Carolina prevented turning into the primary defending champion to lose this early within the match since Louisville knocked off Brittney Griner and Baylor in 2013 within the Candy 16.
Duke takes down rival UNC for a visit to the Elite Eight
Oluchi Okananwa recorded her third double-double of the season to steer ACC Match champion Duke previous North Carolina 47-38 Friday and into the Elite Eight of the ladies’s NCAA Match.
The Blue Devils will make their twelfth Elite Eight look in program historical past and can play both No. 1 seed and defending champion South Carolina or fourth-seeded Maryland, who had been scheduled to play later Friday in Birmingham.
Okananwa scored 10 of her 12 factors within the first half together with 10 rebounds off the bench for Duke, which acquired 26 factors from its bench in comparison with North Carolina’s six. Ashlon Jackson completed with 10 factors, and Toby Fournier, Duke’s main scorer this season who missed the second spherical with an sickness, was held to 3 factors.
Fifth-year senior Alyssa Ustby had 9 factors on 3 of 10 capturing for the Tar Heels, who fell brief of their try to advance to their first Elite 8 since 2014.
Neither staff shot the ball effectively. Duke shot 31% after lacking its first 9 subject targets. North Carolina went 28% from the sphere.
A part of it might have been due to familiarity. The groups performed one another for the second time this season lower than a month in the past. North Carolina coach Courtney Banghart mentioned this week that there is an added stage of consolation going in opposition to a staff they simply performed.
However this was additionally two of the highest defenses within the nation going at it, forcing turnovers, errant photographs and determined heaves late within the shot clock in the beginning of the sport.
It was the primary ever assembly within the NCAA match between the 2 groups, who’ve performed one another 111 occasions. North Carolina nonetheless holds a slight 56-55 edge.
Reporting by The Related Press
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