Women’s Basketball: Virginia fights back from early deficit, but Duke holds on, 60-56

Virginia fell behind early, fought back, hung close, but ultimately fell to Duke, 60-56, Sunday afternoon at John Paul Jones Arena.

Duke (10-5, 2-2 ACC), which got out to an early 13-3 lead, shot 40 percent from the field.

For the third consecutive game, Camryn Taylor led the ‘Hoos (8-6, 0-3 ACC) in scoring, with 17 points on 5-of-10 shooting.

Kymora Johnson also scored in double figures with 14 points, along with pulling down eight rebounds and recording three steals.

Virginia fought back to being down just four, 30-26, at the halftime break, and Jillian Brown hit a three to make it a one-possession game (47-44) with 8:03 to play.

Duke maintained at least a two-possession lead for the vast majority of the fourth quarter.

Johnson made a layup with three seconds left, but the Cavaliers had to foul immediately. Duke made both attempts at the line to seal the win.

“Obviously, we want to win. Everybody wants to win. I still think we’re going to win. We just have to fix some things,” UVA coach Amaka Agugua-Hamilton said. “I think once we get everybody to be on the same page and come bring their A-game on the same day, we’re going to be a pretty good team. That process is taking a little bit longer than we would like, but we’re going to turn the corner.”