Tag: Jordan Wood

Duke women’s basketball dispatches Dayton thanks to Jordan Wood and Toby Fournier

The Duke women’s basketball team rebounded on Thursday with an 84-49 victory over the Dayton Flyers thanks to two standout underclassmen.

The Duke women’s basketball team bounced back into the victory column on Thursday night with an 84-49 win over Dayton powered by multiple excellent performances off the bench.

After Sunday’s loss to Maryland, head coach [autotag]Kara Lawson[/autotag] and the Blue Devils slipped down to 16th in the newest USA TODAY Sports Women’s Basketball Coaches Poll. Despite returning to the friendly walls of Cameron Indoor Stadium, Duke surrendered the first eight points of the game thanks to a pair of 3-pointers from the Flyers.

Dayton’s upper hand completely vanished from there, however. Junior Ashlon Jackson, just one week removed from her 22-point performance against Liberty, made a triple and a layup to take the lid off the basket.

The real boost, however, came from the bench. Freshman forward Toby Fournier, who scored at least 10 points in each of the first three games, notched a go-ahead basket before fighting her way to the basket again on the following possession. All of a sudden, just minutes after not having any points on the board, the Blue Devils led by three.

Fournier finished with 15 points, five rebounds, and three steals, but she wasn’t even the most prolific player off the bench. Jordan Wood ended the evening with a team-high 17 points, including five in the first two minutes of the second quarter.

When Wood buried a 3-point attempt just 12 minutes into the game, the Blue Devils led by 10, and the Cameron Crazies could breathe easy knowing no upsets would take place in Durham.

Duke led by 14 points at the break and outscored the Flyers 47-26 over the last 20 minutes, letting Lawson enjoy a 35-point margin of victory.

“Proud of our group,” Lawson said after the game. “I thought our second half we were able to improve in some key areas. We challenged them at halftime to rebound better so that was nice to see.”

Duke finished with 48 rebounds to Dayton’s 30, and Jadyn Donovan finished with nine by herself. Six different Blue Devils scored at least 10 for the game, and 58 of the team’s 84 points came from the second unit.

The Blue Devils travel again this weekend for a Sunday game against South Dakota State on Sunday afternoon.

Duke women’s basketball dispatches Radford thanks to Jordan Wood’s sophomore emergence

Duke women’s basketball opened its 2024-25 season with a comfortable 89-36 win over Radford powered by a career day from Jordan Wood.

The Duke women’s basketball team opened its anticipated 2024-25 season at Cameron Indoor Stadium on Monday afternoon, and [autotag]Kara Lawson[/autotag] and the Blue Devils resoundingly added a tally to the win column with an 89-36 victory over Radford.

After last year’s trip to the Sweet 16 included an upset of the Ohio State Buckeyes, Duke entered this season ranked No. 11 in the USA TODAY Sports Coaches Poll. The defense certainly looked ready to make a postseason run against the Highlanders as the Blue Devils held Radford to nine points in the opening quarter and 12 points for the entire second half.

Duke came away with 19 steals as a team with six different Blue Devils finished with at least two, including five from reigning ACC Sixth Player of the Year Oluchi Okananwa. The Highlanders shot 23.3% from the floor and 17.6% from 3-point range.

The defense also registered six blocks, including two from sophomore Jordan Wood.

Wood, a 6-foot-4 forward and a four-star prospect out of high school, put together her best collegiate game to start her second year with the program. After only taking the court 14 times as a freshman, she made four of her six shots from the floor and tacked on five free throws for her first double-digit scoring performance, finishing with a team-leading 13 points. She came down with eight rebounds, more than half of her entire 2023-24 total, and logged two steals in a career-high 23 minutes off the bench.

“I took last year as a learning year,” Wood said after the game. “All last year I was learning from the best coach out there — you can quote me on that.”

Reigan Richardson, a member of the Preseason All-ACC Team after she paced the Blue Devils with 12.4 points per game in 2023-24, started her season with 11 points and two rebounds. Four other Duke players added at least 10 points to the winning effort, including 10 from Okananwa and 12 from forward Delaney Thomas.

“Solid first effort for us,” Lawson said after the game. “I’m sure when we look at the film there will be many things to improve on. I thought we got contributions from a lot of different players…The balance was excellent.”

Duke travels to Virginia for a Thursday night game against Liberty, the first of three road games in the team’s next four contests.