Blue Devils Snap Skid, Look Every Bit a Tournament Team
CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. – Even before Duke once again convincingly beat Boston College, the talk of the Blue Devils not making the NCAA Tournament needed to stop. The Blue Devils have a resume for it despite the 5-6 ACC record they had coming in, and there was no way this losing was going to continue. Mike Krzyzewski has never lost five straight at Duke, a stunning statistic that is still intact after Wednesday night’s 78-70 win.
Make no mistake about it, this isn’t the Duke team that won the national title in 2001, or even the Blue Devils of last year. There is just one senior on this team, walk-on Joe Pagliuca. The team’s three co-captains include two sophomores and a junior. There’s inexperience, like freshmen Jon Scheyer and Gerald Henderson playing the minutes they have, and sophomore David McClure starts often while fresh off a redshirt year. Still, this team has no shortage of talent, and that’s never a bad thing to have when the coach is Krzyzewski.
Duke also has BC’s number, having won six straight against the Eagles. Their last two wins have also come against the Eagles, as their last win before the four-game losing streak came against the Eagles at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Clearly, the Eagles were just the medicine this team needed.
“After losing four straight, we wanted to get back on track,” said sophomore guard Greg Paulus. “To do it against the first-place team, at their place in a hostile environment, it’s a big win for us. Hopefully we can build on this one and get things going again.”
Amidst all the talk of the Blue Devils not making the NCAA Tournament, we have to realize that they are human as well. They’re not going to win every time out. They also aren’t going to win every close game, of which they have had plenty – almost no team does that, although it might seem like it at times. A team that wins every close game is a rarity; it’s not just having experience that helps a team pull those out, but also a little luck along the way. The Blue Devils are 2-3 in games decided by five points or less, all of which were one-possession games. That means they’re simply not having a storybook season, and we can’t fault them for that or make like they’re not a good team. The reality is that they’re hardly perfect, even if they are the Duke Blue Devils.
“We’re still learning how to become a good basketball team,” said Krzyzewski. “We’re growing. Except for the start of Maryland, I thought we got to be a better basketball team while we were losing. We just didn’t win.”
In some ways, Wednesday night’s game was a carbon copy of last season’s game between these two teams at The Heights. After the teams stayed close for much of the half, the Blue Devils got going in the final minutes, ending the half with eight straight as part of a 14-3 run to take a 43-32 lead into the locker room.
The way they got there told the story: the Eagles fell asleep at the switch often on defense, allowing the Blue Devils easy baskets. When they actually defended them, the Blue Devils threw the ball away a few times, showing that this Duke team is quite beatable. As if the defensive gaffs weren’t enough, the Eagles also fell asleep with the ball near the end of the half. After an inbound pass to Tyrese Rice off a make, Josh McRoberts caught Rice napping with the ball and stole it for a layup.
Duke dominated the glass in the first half by a 19-8 margin, with 11 offensive rebounds. The boards were where the stat of the game was, as McRoberts (18 points, 11 rebounds, 5 assists) had eight rebounds at the half, while no Eagle had more than seven for the entire game. McRoberts took advantage of the Eagles not boxing out well for a few of those rebounds. Though he’s not a dominant player, McRoberts seems to be coming alive based on last night and his strong second half against Maryland three nights earlier.
The second half saw more of the same as the Blue Devils at one point led 65-41. The Eagles simply didn’t show up to play, their rally in the final minutes to make it a ballgame aside. They simply expended too much energy coming back to finish the job.
“I was confident we were going to win,” said McRoberts of the Eagles’ comeback attempt. “Winning was the only thing on my mind.”
Krzyzewski was happy with how his team handled the losing streak. He saw them maintain confidence, feeling they can still play with anyone. They stayed consistent with their approach and continued to compete, and it can’t hurt that they didn’t play a cupcake schedule in non-conference play.
“We’re still learning, and in this league, because every game is so good, you’re learning while you go through the league, and hopefully you win enough to put yourself in a position to play in March, which I think we’re doing,” he reflected.
Barring a complete collapse the rest of the way, Duke will be in the NCAA Tournament. That might well spell trouble for a team or two, especially given the defense this team has played. The main reason the Blue Devils have won as much as they have is their defense, which is near the top in the ACC. The offense is what has been lacking for a lot of the season, as they’re last in scoring, in the bottom half in field goal percentage, and only three ACC teams turn the ball over more. If the offense comes around a little more, the talk that they might miss the NCAA Tournament will only look more foolish later on.
