MBB: Duke 87, Pitt 52 Post-Game Thread

[Fish80]

Grayson Allen 2-9 from deep range. Again. What's going on? He's gotta start hitting.

No worries. He is a good shooter. His shot will come back.

[Bob Green]

We beat an overmatched opponent; however, there were several positives:

1. Bench production
2. Intensity
3. > 40 percent on 3PT FGs

Grayson Allen going 2-9 from deep really skewed the team's 3PT FG performance. Take away his shots (made and missed), and Duke was 10-20 (50%). Grayson's touch will return all he has to do is keep shooting.

I thought Bagley and Carter fed off each other a bit tonight. When those two are complementing each other inside our frontcourt is a load.

[uh_no]

Grayson Allen 2-9 from deep range. Again. What's going on? He's gotta start hitting.

a lot of his looks from the outside aren't clean. he rarely gets catch and shoot.

[weezie]

Grayson Allen...What's going on?

He's playing as captain. He's the real floor general and he's defending and rebounding like a boss. He's being Quinn right now. The end is the means. It's all going to be fine.

[UrinalCake]

I don’t want to overreact to this win by taking away any more than I would from our wins against the likes of South Dakota or Utah Valley. But it was nice to get the “ACC Road Win” monkey off our backs. Loved the energy from everyone, the bench guys played hard and it was infectious. Guys were committed on D and played with energy that was missing against NC State. Also was pleased to see Bagley keep his composure when things started getting chippy.

If I had to point to some negatives (which is hard to do in a 35-pt win) I would say Carter picking up four fouls early was disappointing as that’s been a recurring issue for him, and our defensive rebounding was poor at times. But all in all a satisfying game to watch. Need to keep it up against Wake and then we have a quick turnaround to head to Miami.

[mgtr]

Duke needed this game. It builds confidence, particularly among the rare subs. Robinson was good, O'Connell was fairly good. I think Bagley learned that he cannot give 50% or he will get blocked. Six players in double figures. Not bad.

[weezie]

Not to forget that Carter came back after the ankle roll, too. Whew.

[Pghdukie]

A good "team effort". Surely something to build on. Foul shooting not good. 1st half defense was great. Bagley was getting mauled in 2nd half. A win is a win !
An announced crowd of 9,100 - of which half were Duke fans. A very good turnout.

[BigZ]

Read nothing into it. Duke blew out inferior opponents before their loses

[BigZ]

a lot of his looks from the outside aren't clean. he rarely gets catch and shoot.

Two of the threes went directly in and out of the hoop

[ipatent]

Read nothing into it. Duke blew out inferior opponents before their loses

Better than losing to the inferior opponent.

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

Read nothing into it. Duke blew out inferior opponents before their loses

Yeah. Our team suxxx.

--strange reaction to a big road win--

[DukieInBrasil]

I really like seeing Trent hunt his jumper instead of just trying to get 3s. That was one of the criticisms of GTJr after the 1st exhibition game: "the dreaded long 2pt jumper, it'll kill his efficiency...he's gotta shoot more 3s". As time has gone on, he continues to take a relatively high % of his shots from 3, and he makes them at a not unreasonable clip. I'm not arguing that he shouldn't take 3s nor that he shouldn't take as many open ones as he gets. Nothing helps a shooter more than seeing one go in, and if he hunting more 2pt shots helps him get on track, i'd like to see more of that. His first make tonight was a 3, then missed a few, and in between made several nice 2pt shots, before making his final 3. That seems like a good balance to me.

[Kedsy]

Wow. Pitt is bad. Like really bad. I had heard they were pretty weak this year but hadn't watched them play yet. It wouldn't surprise me if they win only one conference game all year. Maybe two.

It looked like we were playing a DIII team out there.

I'll be surprised if Pitt wins any ACC games. For most of the game, they didn't look any better than our DII pre-season opponents.

I said this in the Duke Defense thread, but we gave up a ton of three-attempts. If Pitt had hit threes at their usual percentage and we had turned them over at our usual percentage (we had a pretty good TO rate of 23.6% tonight, much better than our season average), our dRtg for the game would not have been very good. As it was, neither of those things happened, so our dRtg was pretty good, and we're back in Pomeroy's top 100 (92nd), defensively. So thank goodness for small favors, but I don't think our defensive problems are solved yet.

Justin and Jack played really well, but expecting either of them to play in competitive games is asking for disappointment. K almost always plays the bench in games he expects to win by 25+, and this game looked like garbage time by the first timeout of the first half.

On the good side, a pretty dominant offensive performance. 21 assists to 6 turnovers, a game eFG% of 62.5%, and an amazing offensive rebounding performance (51.7% OR%). And all that with our bench playing 70 minutes. Just think how good it might have been if we could have hit a free throw.

Overall, it's great to win an ACC road game by 35 points. Miami only won by 14 at Pitt, so who knows.

[ipatent]

Justin and Jack played really well, but expecting either of them to play in competitive games is asking for disappointment. K almost always plays the bench in games he expects to win by 25+, and this game looked like garbage time by the first timeout of the first half.

A little different situation tonight with Bolden and DeLaurier out, at least one of them probably would have played even if the game was close.

[Kedsy]

A little different situation tonight with Bolden and DeLaurier out, at least one of them probably would have played even if the game was close.

I don't know. Maybe. I'll be surprised if it happens that way.

[TruBlu]

Pitt fans shouting “Bagley suxxx” during the game - trying to become the new Maryland of the ACC. They need to step it up a little by insulting someone’s younger sister, throwing water bottles and heated coins, and mixing in a riot or two.

But it’s a good start.

[Kedsy]

Pitt fans shouting “Bagley suxxx” during the game - trying to become the new Maryland of the ACC. They need to step it up a little by insulting someone’s younger sister, throwing water bottles and heated coins, and mixing in a riot or two.

But it’s a good start.

I was more impressed by the fans chanting "overrated" when they were down by 21.

[CDu]

I was more impressed by the fans chanting "overrated" when they were down by 21.

That was easily my favorite moment of the game.

[Pghdukie]

That was easily my favorite moment of the game.

My favorite moment was when Carter re-entered the game !