TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Toronto-born reserve Toby Fournier scored 10 of her career-best 28 points in the fourth quarter to help No. 16 Duke pull away late and beat No. 24 Florida State 71-57 on Sunday night to clinch the No. 3 seed — and a double bye — at the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament.
Duke (23-7, 14-4 ACC) plays a quarterfinal game on Friday. Florida State will be the No. 5 seed and plays Thursday in a second-round game.
Fournier, a rookie, made 11 of 15 from the field and 6 of 8 from the free-throw line. Ashlon Jackson scored 14 points for Duke and Taina Mair added 10.
“It’s one of the great performances of the season in our league, regardless of class, when you look at what Toby did tonight," Duke coach Kara Lawson told reporters after the game.
Makayla Timpson made a layup 12 seconds into the fourth quarter to make it 49-all. Fournier scored eight points before Jackson's layup about 3 1/2 minutes later capped a 12-0 run and the Blue Devils led by at least nine the rest of the way.
Timpson led the Seminoles (23-7, 13-5) with 25 points on 11-of-19 shooting. O’Mariah Gordon and Ta’Niya Latson added nine points apiece but combined to shoot 21% (7 of 33) from the field. Latson, who went in as the nation's leading scorer at 26.0 per game, made 3 of 21 and 1 of 8 from behind the arc.
Duke outrebounded the Seminoles 51-35, scored 16 second-chance points off 19 offensive rebounds and outscored FSU 12-6 from the free-throw line.
Florida State, which went into the game as the No. 1 scoring offence in the nation (89.4 per game), scored its fewest points in a game this season. The Seminoles shot 36.4% (24 of 66) from the field, also a season low.
The six-foot-two Fournier has averaged 23 points and 7.3 rebounds the past three games, all wins.
"I think there's a lot that goes into the performance I had tonight," she said. "A lot of hard games, hard practices leading up to this point. For me it was just all the practices, all the early mornings I put in to performing how I did."
Lawson says Fournier is a shoo-in for some post-season hardware. She's averaging 13.6 points and 5.3 rebounds on 54-per-cent shooting from the field.
"It goes without saying this is the freshman of the year in the league," Lawson said. "If you can't see that, you've got to go to the eye doctor."
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