Jones Authors Dominant NCAA Tournament Performance for NC State
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Throughout the 2025-26 season, sophomore guard Zamareya Jones played with confidence and edge for NC State. Both of those things came out in bunches in the Wolfpack's 76-61 victory over Tennessee in the first round of the 2026 NCAA Tournament. It was a night when her team needed her more than usual and she answered the call with her best performance in a Wolfpack uniform.
Jones scored a career-high 30 points in the 15-point win, knocking down 9-of-15 shots from the field. Her effort and energy level on both ends helped the Pack overcome the high-octane pressure of the Volunteers, who rotated players in and out with far greater frequency than Wes Moore did for NC State. In the end, the Vols had no answer for Jones.
Leaving it all on the floor
30 PIECE 😮💨 @ZamareyaJones #MarchMadness x @PackWomensBball pic.twitter.com/pcfuDOIAK7
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessWBB) March 21, 2026
The pressure on Jones increased in the third quarter when her backcourt partner, junior guard Zoe Brooks, went down with a foot injury and left the game. In need of a spark, Jones seized the moment and scored nine points for the Wolfpack, holding onto the large lead the team built in the first half, also in large part because of Jones' play.
The sophomore scored or assisted on 22 of NC State's first 34 points in the win, but her work down the stretch ended up being far more important with Brooks in the locker room. As for her motivation, Jones expressed her feelings over Tennessee's reaction to playing NC State for a second time in the 2025-26 season during the Selection Sunday festivities and took it personally.
"When they popped up on the screen, they had a lot to say about running it back," Jones said. "That just fooled me. I'm the type of person that feeds into that stuff. Coach Moore isn't big with that, but that's just the type of person I am. ... Just seeing them say run it back like they were going to beat us, we knew we beat them the first time and we could beat them again."
With Brooks out of the game, Tennessee's relentless, but often ineffective and beatable, full-court pressure began to squeeze some of the energy out of Jones. Rather than play into more mistakes, the sophomore showed more maturity and leaned on her teammates to give her a break, particularly one of the team's freshmen, Destiny Lunan.
MOVING ON BABY!!!! https://t.co/yQXvTSI1zk pic.twitter.com/dZdDFRGpAg
— NC State WBB 🐺🏀 (@PackWomensBball) March 21, 2026
"I was tired, I'm not going to lie," Jones said. "She definitely helped me bring the ball up the court, getting off the ball a little bit. She made a couple of mistakes, but she's a freshman, so I took responsibility. ... She's a great kid. She definitely is a bucket and she definitely stepped up big in this game."
It marked the sixth 20-plus-point performance for Jones in the season and it couldn't have come at a more important time. Obviously, the spotlight shifts to Brooks' injury as the Wolfpack awaits a Sunday matchup against No. 2 seed Michigan in its home building, but the dominant outing from Jones should give the team some confidence heading into its second game of the NCAA Tournament.
Tucker Sennett graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in Sports Journalism from the esteemed Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. A former basketball player, he has gained valuable experience working at Cronkite News and brings a deep passion for sports and reporting to his role as the NC State Wolfpack Beat Writer On SI.
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