No. 14 Duke women roll past No. 20 Syracuse 72-55

Duke has spent this women’s basketball season reestablishing itself as a power in the ACC after last season’s disappointing campaign.

On Friday night brought a chance to deliver a big dose of redemption and the Blue Devils were dominant in doing so.

Syracuse handed Duke an embarrassing loss a year ago. But the No. 20 Orange never challenged No. 14 Duke this time, becoming the latest team to fail against the Blue Devils’ stout defense as Duke posted an easy 72-55 win at Cameron Indoor Stadium.

This game was a stark contrast to the teams’ 2016 ACC game at the Carrier Dome, when the host Orange routed Duke 86-50.

That loss negatively impacted the Blue Devils, who went 20-12 and missed the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1994.

While preparing to face the Orange again this week, nearly every turnover or mistake in practice caused a returning player to remind everyone those kind of things led to bad things against Syracuse a year ago.

“Everyone was super focused,” Duke senior forward Oderah Chidom said. “We’ve been talking about it all year. That left a bad taste in our mouth last year and we wanted to show something this year.”

The Blue Devils (21-4, 9-3 in ACC) certainly did that. Duke jumped to a quick 12-3 lead and smothered Syracuse (17-8, 8-4).

Scoring 70 points against Duke has proven nearly impossible. The Orange became the 20th consecutive team to fail to do so this season.

Syracuse senior guards Alexis Peterson (23.7 points per game) and Brittany Sykes (19.1 points per game) have been among the nation’s most potent backcourt duos. They combined to score just 20 points -- less than half their average -- against Duke as Peterson had 19 points on 6 of 15 shooting while Sykes scored 11 on 3 of 16 shooting.

“Trying to hold them down and frustrate them, that’s what you want to do,” Duke coach Joanne P. McCallie said. “It’s a team defense. Everybody was aware of Peterson and Sykes. They are great players and you have to be aware. That’s team defense all the way on both of them.”

Syracuse shot just 25.4 percent and made only 10 of the 37 3-pointers it hoisted up.

“It wasn’t a good shooting night for us,” Syracuse coach Quentin Hillsman said. “A lot of it had to do with them. We got a lot of open shots in the first quarter and they made some adjustments. You have to give Duke a lot of credit.”

Junior guard Rebecca Greenwell led Duke’s offense with 18 points, just missing her third consecutive 20-point game. She also grabbed 10 rebounds for her second double-double of the season.

But Duke’s dominance on offense came on the interior, where the Blue Devils outscored the Orange 44-8 on points in the paint.

Chidom scored 16 points off the bench while staring forward Kendall Cooper had 12 points on 6 of 8 shooting.

“It’s important to take whatever is there, the best shot and the best opportunity,” McCallie said. “They pressed us early on and we really executed well against the press. We moved the ball very well and the openings were right there for Kendall and she stepped up and finished. You’ve just got to take what’s there.”

This story was originally published February 10, 2017 at 10:28 PM with the headline "No. 14 Duke women roll past No. 20 Syracuse 72-55."