Duke Women's CBB Coach Kara Lawson Says Men's Ball Was Used in 1st Half of FSU Loss

A Jan. 28 women's college basketball game between Florida State and Duke was played with a men's basketball for the first half.

Blue Devils head coach Kara Lawson sounded off about the incident while speaking to reporters after Thursday's win over Pittsburgh.

"This would never happen in a men's game. This would never happen," she said. "It's embarrassing for our sport."

Per Wilson, the official ball used in women's college basketball has a circumference that is one inch smaller and weighs two ounces less than regulation men's ball.

It's not clear how the mix up happened, though Lawson did note some of her players were "complaining about the ball" throughout the first half of the Florida State game.

"To have a game that, at the end of the season, could be the difference between a seed, between a title, my players don't deserve that and neither do their players," Lawson explained. "It's a complete failure. And you can figure out who the people I'm talking about that failed the sport and our players and both teams."

Game officials changed the ball at the start of the second half after Duke assistant coach Winston Gandy discovered the problem when he went to the scorer's table at the end of the first half.

"We have concluded through our investigation that it was a men's ball," Lawson said. "The conference and Florida State is saying that it wasn't."

Lawson said she wanted to appeal the game but the ACC wouldn't let her.

Both teams struggled offensively in the first half. Florida State held a 30-22 lead over Duke going into the intermission. The Seminoles outscored the Blue Devils 40-35 in the second half en route to a 70-57 victory.

Lawson made it clear that "Florida State beat us," but she couldn't say how the outcome might have been different if both teams played with a regulation ball for the entire game.