Notebook: Women’s pairings set for ACC/Big Ten Challenge

The ACC and Big Ten announced the matchups Wednesday for the 2016 ACC/Big Ten Women’s Basketball Challenge. Next season’s Challenge will mark the 10th straight year of the event. All 14 Big Ten teams and 14 of the 15 ACC teams will participate.

This year’s event will be played in a two-day format beginning Nov. 30.

The six-game slate Nov. 30 will have home games for Syracuse (vs. Michigan State), Pittsburgh (vs. Purdue) and Boston College (vs. Penn State), with Notre Dame (at Iowa), Florida State (at Minnesota) and Wake Forest (at Illinois) on the road. On Dec. 1, N.C. State (vs. Indiana), Virginia Tech (vs. Nebraska), Louisville (vs. Maryland) and Georgia Tech (vs. Michigan) will host Big Ten opponents, and Duke (at Rutgers), North Carolina (at Wisconsin), Virginia (at Northwestern) and Miami (at Ohio State) visit their inter-conference foes.

Duke: Sophomore Lisa Maguire won the Ulster Women’s Open Championship on Tuesday at the Royal Belfast Golf Club in Ireland. A native of Cavan, Ireland, Maguire registered four match-play wins after finishing second in stroke-play qualifying with rounds of 76 and 77.

In the championship, Maguire went up against Aedin Murphy, who was third in stroke-play qualifying.

After leaving her approach shot just short of the 17th green, Maguire chipped her ball to 2 feet for par. Murphy’s birdie attempt edged past the hole and the championship was awarded to Maguire.

▪ After knocking off third-seeded Southern California on Wednesday morning, the sixth-seeded Blue Devils ended their run at the NCAA Championship in the semifinals. They dropped a 3-2 decision to second-seeded Stanford at the Eugene Country Club in Eugene, Ore.

East Carolina: Senior Frida Gustafsson Spang was named second-team All-America by the Women’s Golf Coaches Association.The selection marks the first time an East Carolina women’s golfer has been named an All-America.

Mount Olive: The Trojans’ Jonathan Dahlke and Austin Steagall were selected to participate in the NCAA Division II National Championships at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla., this week.

Duke: The Blue Devils’ women’s team will make its first NCAA appearance Friday. The Blue Devils are led by first-year coach Cooke Carcagno. Duke recorded upsets to finish second in the First Varsity Eight, the Second Varsity Eight and the First Varsity Four to tie Syracuse for second place. This was the team’s highest finish since 2006.

UNC: Junior Ronnie Schneider advanced in singles play at the NCAA Men’s Tennis Singles Championship in Tulsa, Okla., beating UNC-Wilmington’s Santtu Leskinen.6-2, 4-6, 6-3 to reach the Round of 32.

From news releases

This story was originally published May 25, 2016 at 11:30 PM with the headline "Notebook: Women’s pairings set for ACC/Big Ten Challenge."