No. 1 Duke overcomes double-digit halftime deficit to avoid massive NCAA tournament upset against No. 16 Siena

Duke needed quite the second-half comeback to avoid one of the biggest upsets in NCAA tournament history on Thursday.

That’s probably not a sentence you expected to read.

The No. 1 overall seed beat No. 16 Siena 71-65 after trailing by 11 points at halftime. It was the first time in NCAA tournament history that a No. 1 seed trailed by 10 points or more to a No. 16 seed at the half and Siena’s 13-point lead in the second half was the biggest deficit Duke had faced all season.

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The Blue Devils, who closed as a 28.5-point favorite, finally took a second-half lead with 4:25 to go after slowly chipping away at Siena’s margin. After Cameron Boozer tied the game at 61-61 at the free-throw line with 5:08 remaining, Duke forced a Siena turnover and went up by two on a layup by Isaiah Evans.

It was Duke’s first lead of the game since there were more than 17 minutes to go in the first half. And it’s fair to wonder if the Blue Devils simply wore Siena down in the second half.

Coach Gerry McNamara’s team nearly became the first team since DePaul in the 1979 Final Four to play its starting five all 40 minutes without any substitutions. McNamara didn’t make his first substitution until there were 10 seconds to go.

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If Siena’s starters got tired in the second half — and it’s hard to argue that they didn’t — it was reflected in their shooting stats. The Saints missed multiple shots at the rim in the final 20 minutes and shot less than 25% from the field.

Siena even went over six minutes without scoring down the stretch until a Riley Mulvey putback with 1:06 to go.

But even though Siena had a hard time getting the ball in the basket, the Saints still had a chance with less than a minute to go. Mulvey’s basket cut the Duke lead to four and a Boozer turnover gave Siena an opportunity to cut the lead to one. However, Gavin Doty missed a 3-pointer before Siena was forced to foul out of desperation.

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“[McNamara], he outreached me, they…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/mens-college-basketball/breaking-news/article/no-1-duke-overcomes-double-digit-halftime-deficit-to-avoid-massive-ncaa-tournament-upset-against-no-16-siena-210413052.html

Author : Nick Bromberg

Publish date : 2026-03-19 21:04:00

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