Zam Jones delivered the coup de grace on Sunday afternoon, draining a 3-pointer with 33 seconds left to give NC State a 65-59 advantage as the shot clock expired. It’s no surprise that she was able to do that because she had such a great game.
The team made key plays down the stretch – Khamil Pierre’s two free throws to take a 62-59 lead with less than 90 seconds left, then a big defensive stop and then Jones’ dagger.
It looked like it might be an easy game as Davidson couldn’t hit the wide side of the barn in the first quarter and NC State jumped out to a 20-4 lead, but the Wildcats are a good shooting team, especially from 3-point range (36.7 percent, 37th nationally), and they eventually found their footing. After starting 0-7 from three-point range, they went 10-23 the rest of the way to get back into the game. Entering the fourth quarter, State’s 12-point halftime lead was reduced to just three points.
advertise
Charles Dunn, who shot 31.9% from three-point range that year, was on fire, scoring 13 points on 6 shots from beyond the arc, leading the team. But NC State never trailed in this game and did enough in the fourth quarter to prevent Davidson from overcoming the odds.
Jones was a big part of that, as was Camille Pierre, who finished with 23 points and 13 rebounds. For her, it was just another day at the office. Led by Pierre’s 10-16 shooting, NC State shot 52.7 percent from two-point range while Davidson shot just 37 percent from three. That’s a key difference, as the Wolves shot just 4-for-18 from 3-point range (Zam hit 3 of those).
It was a good win – a true road game against a top-55 opponent that had struggled against several other P5 teams. The Wildcats took Baylor to overtime earlier this season but lost by just a bucket. Torvik projects their record to be 14-4 in league play, so this win should go a long way.
That will do that for the Wolfpack in 2025; we won’t see them again until the New Year’s Day game against Stanford.