It’s amazing that a team this unselfish has come together in the NIL era.
Consider this: since losing at Clemson, when Cooper Flagg was ill, Duke has won by the following margins:
Duke vs. Cal – 78-57 (+21)
Duke vs. Stanford – 106-70 (+36)
Duke vs. Virginia – 80-62 (+18)
Duke vs. Illinois – 110-67 (+43)
Duke vs. Miami 97-60 (+37)
Duke vs. Florida State 100-65 (+35)
Duke vs. Wake Forest – 93-60 (+33)
That’s a crazy level of dominance. You have to factor in that this is an historically weak ACC and that Illinois had a lot of disruption between illness and injuries.
Even so, that’s pretty wild.
Consider too that against Florida State and Wake Forest, Duke didn’t really shoot all that well: against FSU, the Blue Devils hit 26.7 percent of their threes (8-30) and 43.8 percent (32-73) overall. And against Wake Forest Monday night, Duke shot very poorly in the beginning, shooting 1-8 in the first 5 minutes.
In the end, it didn’t matter: Duke finished at 35.9 percent from deep (14-39) and 47.2 percent (34-72) overall.
That didn’t end up being wretchedly bad shooting, but it’s not like Duke did at Miami (60 percent from behind the line and 56.1 percent overall) or Illinois (52.2 percent for threes and 55.6 percent overall).
So how is Duke racking up such big numbers?
We’d argue a few things.
First, as noted, the opposition has been unusually weak. Secondly, Duke has been an outstanding defensive team that wears teams down. Third, Duke’s size is a real problem, with the smallest starter(s) being 6-6. Fourth, Cooper Flagg is a force multiplier. And fifth, this team appears to really enjoy playing together and has unusual chemistry.
Let’s start with Flagg. If he were a selfish player, he could focus on offense and score 30 points a night. But he’s not. He wants to win and he not only finds the best shot no matter who gets it, but he’s the best defender on the team and the best passer as well.
At 7-2, Khaman Maluach is the tallest player on the team and tied for the tallest in Duke history, we believe (with at least Marty Nessley). He’s learning the game still and content to build from rebounding and defense first.
Kon Knueppel is the guy who is most willing to dive on the floor and who isn’t scared of dirty work. You have to be a pretty self-centered player not to want to play like him as much as you can.
Tyrese Proctor has been through some hard knocks at Duke and has kept battling. He’s always been a good defender and now he’s emerged as a dangerous offensive threat as well.
Sion James has become a bit more offensive-minded lately but he’s willing to
defend and distribute. Fellow transfers Maliq Brown and Mason Gillis have also been willing to play hard and subordinate themselves to the team.
And Isaiah Evans, who is often called a flamethrower for his three point prowess, has worked hard to become a better defender. And his teammates understand his gift and get him the ball where he can do the most damage.
Finally, Patrick Ngongba, who we once thought might redshirt, has developed very fast and what we see now is a guy who can defend and hit the boards and also move to get open layups, all of which is good.
However, he is also increasingly looking like one of the smartest players on the team. We saw two bits of evidence for that Monday, with one being his backwards pass over defenders while flat on his back and slapping the ball back out to a teammate when he couldn’t fully control the rebound.
Duke obviously misses Brown’s remarkable defense, but Ngongba has come on so fast that he’s minimized Brown’s absence to a large extent (if somehow you didn’t know, Brown injured his shoulder against Virginia and hasn’t played since). He can’t do what Brown does, but what he’s doing is really good too.
So looking at this, what do you have? Can this team make a deep run in the NCAA tournament?
No one can predict that. It’s an eternal crapshoot where the odds are always against every team. However, Duke has four things going for it that you really need to do well in the post-season.
- guard play
- defense
- team unity
- coaching
Traditionally, we always say that a good tournament team needs outstanding point guard leadership, but in Duke’s case, every starter except for Maluach is capable of playing point on any given play. It’s not point by committee; it’s just that James, Proctor, Flagg and Knueppel are capable of running the team. When Flagg had to leave the FSU game, Knueppel just plugged in and took over his ball handling responsibilities. Worked out just fine.
Duke’s defense switches brilliantly. How often have we seen Maluach and another player chase a ball handler out to nearly half court? And then Maluach gets back under the basket! It’s really rather extraordinary. And then Flagg causes mayhem wherever he is and if a ball gets loose, Knueppel is ready to dive on it.
We say team unity but it could just as easily be team chemistry. Our sense is that a lot of it comes from Flagg, who truly doesn’t seem to care about his points, and Knueppel, who does a lot of the dirty work. But that sort of underestimates the other contributions to selflessness. Coach Jon Scheyer calls some players connectors. That seems right. Everyone is in on it.
Speaking of Scheyer, he’s done an unbelievable job with this team. He won 27 games in each of his first two seasons and now, with one game left in the regular season, he has Duke at 27-3 and 18-1 in the ACC and, as we’ve seen in the last several games, Duke is demolishing opponents.
The average victory margin since losing at Clemson has been 31.8 points per game
Again, you have to keep in mind that this is a weakened ACC, but this level of dominance is reminiscent of Duke’s 1999 juggernaut.
Look at what that team racked up after a narrow win over St. John’s on January 24th:
Duke 92 St. Johns 88 (+4)
Duke 98 UNC 77 (+21)
Duke 80 NC State 61 (+19)
Duke 95 Maryland 77 (+18)
Duke 87 Georgia Tech 79 (+8)
Duke 100 Virginia 54 (+46)
Duke 102 Wake Forest 71 (+31)
Duke 85 Florida State 59 (+26)
Duke 92 Clemson 65 (+27)
Duke 96 DePaul 64 (+32)
Duke 81 UNC 61 (+20)
ACC Tournament
Duke 104 Virginia 67 (+37)
Duke 83 NC State 68 (+15)
Duke 96 UNC 63 (+33)
NCAA Tournament
Duke 99 Florida A&M 58 (+41)
Duke 97 Tulsa 56 (+41)
Duke 78 SW Missouri State 61 (+17)
Duke 85 Temple 64 (+21)
Final Four
Duke 68 Michigan State 62 (+6)
Duke 74 UConn 77 (-3)
Is this year’s team on a similar trajectory?
Possibly.
Winning in Chapel Hill is never a sure thing and that rivalry has frequently seen the underdog play brilliantly and win. You can look up the various games, but Duke beat UNC when Carolina was #3 in 1971-72. Mike Krzyzewski’s first win against UNC came in 1981 when the Tar Heels were a heavy favorite.
There are a bunch of those, then there are the games where a Wendell Moore or Dante Calabria won on a last-second play. Chris Duhon, too.
So leave that out of it for the moment and let’s see what happens in the post-season. This team is pretty unusual in some very good ways. Whatever happens, it’s been an absolute privilege to see this group come together in the way that it has.
Leave a Reply