The Replay: Key events and results from the week that was in Triangle sports
From a stunning Duke loss, to a stunning NC State women’s basketball win, not to mention a full slate of Hurricanes games, there was plenty going on last week in the Triangle.
Here are a few highlights:
Comeback for the ages
There are comeback wins, and then there is what N.C. State pulled off Thursday night.
The Wolfpack erased a 16-point lead in four minutes, igniting the capacity crowd and picking up its third straight home win over a ranked opponent. In one of the most impressive games of the year, the Pack came alive in the fourth quarter and knocked off the Louisville Cardinals, 68-59.
N.C. State went on an 11-0 run to pull to within one after trailing by double-digits most of the game.
Diamond Johnson’s three with 5:31 remaining gave N.C. State its first lead (55-53) since they led 11-10 in the first quarter.
A combination of Johnson, Jakia Brown-Turner and Elissa Cunane rallied the troops. The Pack trailed by 14 entering the final quarter, but veterans Johnson, Cunane and Brown-Turner combined for 29 points down the stretch to key the rally.
PGA, here he comes
Akshay Bhatia’s two-shot win at the Korn Ferry Tour’s Greater Exuma Bahamas Classic put him in some elite company, and inched the teenager from Wake Forest closer to his ultimate goal: playing on the PGA Tour.
Wednesday, Bhatia nearly holed out on the 18th hole of the final round — he tapped in for birdie — to cap an impressive week and vault to near the top of the tour’s points standings. If he finished in the Top 25 by year’s end, he will earn a place on the PGA Tour in 2023.
After deciding to skip college and turn pro at 17, Bhatia has been scraping by on sponsor’s exemptions and Monday qualifying, trying to win enough money to get some kind of status. He narrowly missed on a full Korn Ferry exemption at qualifying school, but got into the Bahamas event, and the rest is history.
NC Hall calls latest class
NFL stars Torry Holt and Sam Mills headline the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame’s 2022 induction class, which also includes NFL athletic trainer Ronnie Barnes, UCLA and NBA player Henry Bibby, Duke women’s golf coach Dan Brooks, Winston-Salem State football player Timmy Newsome, Virginia Union men’s basketball coach Dave Robbins and former WRAL-5 sports anchor Tom Suiter.
Baseball Hall-of-Famer Luke Appling and early women’s basketball star Missouri Arledge Morris are posthumous inductees, along with Mills. Muggsy Bogues, part of the 2021 class, will be inducted with this group in April after he was unable to attend last year’s ceremony.
The induction ceremony will be held at the Raleigh Convention Center on April 22.
N&O sports columnist Luke DeCock and staff writer Jonas Pope IV contributed to this report.
