When Duke coach Gail Goestenkors won ACC Coach of the Year honors the other day, she deflected the praise and pointed to North Carolina State coach Kay Yow as more deserving for having returned from battling a cancer recurrence to vault her team into the Top 25.
Perhaps Goestenkors was right. Yow’s team continued its giant-killing ways Saturday, toppling previously undefeated No. 1 Duke in the ACC semifinals, 70-65, in the biggest upset of the season. The last time NC State defeated a No. 1 team was Jan. 12, 1978, when they beat Wayland Baptist, 98-86.
“This emotion lifts me up,” Yow said. “I feel stronger with this. ... We’ve got to keep going. This is no time to stop.”
Yow directed a spirited comeback after the Wolfpack went down 14-2 in the opening minutes. They were down only 34-31 by the half. The second half see-sawed until Duke went up by eight with six minutes remaining, but seniors Gillian Goring, a 6-7 center, and guard Ashley Key orchestrated an 11-2 run to go up 64-63. Two free throws by Duke’s own 6-7 senior center, Alison Bales, put Duke up 65-64. But Key was, well, Key. She hit the go-ahead jumper with 1:18 left, and then all Duke could do was foul. Key finished with a season-high 21 points.
Duke had been playing the best basketball in the women’s NCAA. They’d dispatched most of their opponents with ease with their stifling defense and stellar performances by ACC Player of the Year Lindsey Harding and Bales. But they couldn’t beat inspiration.
Yow’s team, filled with six seniors, is playing inspired basketball. What else can they do, when they watch their coach, her voice hoarse, her body bloated by the drugs coursing through it, having to take IV fluids daily just so she can do what she loves: coach. Those nagging injuries from a season of hardwood pounding suddenly pale when you see your coach carted from practice on a stretcher, then return the next day to lead her team over then-No. 2 North Carolina.
On that day, the NC State court was named for Yow, a coaching legend long before her most recent battle with cancer. She’s in the Naismith and Women’s Basketball halls of fame. A few games earlier, on Feb. 5 against Florida State, she’d gotten her 700th career win.
Earlier this season Yow had taken a two-month leave to get treatment for Stage 4 breast cancer. It is an aggressive disease that is ravaging her body but not her spirit and certainly not her team’s. They’re 10-of-11 since Yow’s return.
Why return to a demanding, energy-sapping job? Because it’s what she is, what she does, what she loves most.
“I know people say I’m doing too much,” she said to Christine Brennan of USA Today. “I know I have to take care of myself. But it’s not like I have a cold or pneumonia and if I rest it will get better. Rest is not going to cure cancer. If rest were just the answer, that’s what I would do.
“But if someone can be involved with something that is a passion for them, then I don’t think there’s anything wrong in trying to do that. Coaching lifts me up. Once the ball is tossed up, I forget pretty much about everything and just focus on the game. If I just do nothing, I feel like I’m giving in to the disease.”
Her refusal to give in has redoubled the love and respect she receives from her team, fans and even opponents. She received a hearty standing ovation when she entered the court Saturday in Greensboro, N.C. The crowd was decidedly pro-Wolfpack. Even Carolina-blue-clad fans cheered on NC State. Sure, they’re fans of anyone playing against Duke, but for Carolina fans to side with another Tobacco Road rival is a big deal. It’s also a big deal that ACC players have been wearing pink laces in their high tops this season in honor of Yow, and coaches – including the Duke staff Saturday -- have donned pink.
The Carolina goodwill will cease, though, because UNC, having defeated NCAA champ Maryland in the other semi-final, will face NC State today in the final.
Still, Duke’s Goestenkors might owe her team’s phenomenal success this season to Yow. Before Saturday, the last time Duke lost was in last year’s NCAA Championship game. The crown was Duke’s for the taking until Maryland freshman Kristi Toliver’s three in the final seconds capped a 13-point comeback and sent the game into overtime, and the Terps stole what’s proven to be an elusive championship for the Blue Devils. After the game, Yow grabbed Goestenkors and told her, “What is delayed is not denied.”
Coach G and her team have used Yow’s words and the sting of that finals loss as inspiration, and they helped carry Duke to a 29-0 regular season.
But they couldn’t carry Duke past a more inspired NC State.