Originally Posted by
Saratoga2
Unfortunately the whole defense had issues. I wonder who coach K thought was second best? Was it Amile?
It would be bad form, wouldn't it, to leave the defender's award vacant 'cuz no one was deserving?
Seriously guys, there were two warnings that our defense was the pits this year: (1) in December, when Josh and Tyler entered the starting lineup for a few games. I mean, these guys are not great defenders, but at least they know the defensive schemes. (2) When Tyler moved into the starting lineup at point guard for good. I love me some Tyler Thornton, but he is not a major college point guard. It had to be for defense, and, while tough as nails and the master of the hard foul, he is not especially quick or skilled at defense.
And because we lose 60 percent of our scoring, and 56 percent of our fouls (53 percent of our minutes), I have a hard time understanding our projected top five ranking. Plus, we lose our best defender and Tyler, who played mostly because of defense -- it is hard to see how we are gonna be better at defense.
But, maybe we will be better at defense. That would require a big step forward by Matt Jones, not to mention Rasheed, who is certainly athletic enough but tended to lose focus. Marshall can swat 'em with the best of college centers. There may be a potential role for Semi as a defender. We would need Jahlil to be a lot better at defense than Jabari. And it would help a lot if Justise is a good defender on day one, although to my knowledge that his never happened for a freshman under Coach K. It may take a miracle for Duke to be significantly better at defense in 2015 than this year.
Sage Grouse
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'When I got on the bus for my first road game at Duke, I saw that every player was carrying textbooks or laptops. I coached in the SEC for 25 years, and I had never seen that before, not even once.' - David Cutcliffe to Duke alumni in Washington, DC, June 2013