Third seed Notre Dame led by 15 at the break, and then held off a second-half Duke rally, to beat the second seed Blue Devils, 74-64, in the 2015 ACC Tournament semifinals on Friday.
The Irish (28-5, 16-4 ACC) advance to the ACC Tournament final and will play #5 seed UNC (24-10, 14-7 ACC), which upset the tournament’s top seed, UVA, earlier on Friday.
Notre Dame dominated the first half, shooting 53.1 percent from the field to go into halftime up 41-26.
The margin stayed around the eight- to 12-point mark for much of the second half before Duke (29-4, 16-4 ACC) went on a 12-4 run over a 3:56 stretch to cut the lead to 68-64 with 3:13 to go on a three-pointer by freshman Tyus Jones.
Those would be the last points that Duke would score. The Blue Devils missed three three-pointers, committed two turnovers and missed two free throws in the final stretch.
But it was still 68-64 Notre Dame when guard Pat Connaughton hit a jumper at the foul line with 1:13 to go to stretch the lead to six.
A turnover and missed three by Duke senior guard Quinn Cook took away two chances for the Blue Devils to chip away at that margin, and Notre Dame sealed the game going 4-for-4 at the line in the final 22 seconds.
Duke freshman center Jahlil Okafor had a monster night in the paint, scoring 28 points on 13-of-18 shooting from the field, but was just 2-for-8 from the line.
Bonzie Colson scored 17 points off the bench to pace Notre Dame, which shot 50 percent from the field for the game.
Duke shot 45.0 percent from the field and struggled uncharacteristically from long-range, going 3-of-17 (17.6 percent) from the bonusphere on the night.
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