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Thread: Phase IV - 2008

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Feb 2007

    Phase IV - 2008

    We wrapped up Phase III with a 10-0 record -- not too shabby! So let's move on to Phase IV, and consider that our final nine games of the regular season. The best thing about this upcoming period? We can still get better -- a lot better. Here's what I'll be watching...

    Can we advance from beating teams to dominating them?
    Look, Duke is playing great. But we haven't had a lot of those vintage 30-10 starts to a game where we jump all over a team early and then keep expanding the lead. I'm not saying Duke should be able to do this against good teams. But Duke will play a couple weaker ACC foes (including this Saturday). Part of taking the next step as a team will be stepping on the throat of inferior opponents and not letting up.

    Can Kyle Singler avoid foul trouble?
    This is a carryover from Phase III and it's self-explanatory. We need him on the floor. Period.

    Will Lance Thomas' improvement be linear, or is it a blip?
    Last season, Lance showed flashes. There as his 15-point performance against Marquette. There was his 10-point, 9-board game against B.C. But his good performances were largely random; he was inconsistent. And Lance did not have a good start to this season. But starting with the Clemson game, Lance has been getting a little better each night. He's learning how to use his quickness against bigger foes. He's staying on his feet a bit better. He's grabbing a few more tough rebounds. Against UNC, he started scoring and blocking shots. He still has a major foul problem -- at least four fouls in each of his last six games, including two foul-outs -- but that sort of comes with his role. If Lance can become someone of a steady presence defensively and on the boards and can finish inside, this team will get a lot better.

    Can Duke's free throw shooting improve?
    Duke is not an awful free-throw shooting team. 69% at the college level isn't good, but it's not horrible. And Duke has four excellent FT shooters to go to late in games -- Scheyer, Paulus, Smith and Singler. The real issue is Nelson and Henderson. They get to the line more than anyone, and they handle the ball a lot. I've come to accept that as a senior with a funky release, Nelson can't be expected to do much better than 64.5%, although I can hope for some improvement. But Gerald is an enigma. The kid has a nice-lookng, fluid stroke. There is absolutely no reason he should be shooting 61.1%. If Nelson can shoot slightly better and Gerald can shoot the way he is capable, life will be much easier at the offensive end.

    Whither Duke's health?
    Obviously, Duke can't afford injuries to key guys. But within this category are two key questions. 1) Zoubek apparently will return, but in what shape? And isn't there a major risk of injuring his foot again? And, if he is back, can Duke find a way to utilize him? For the most part, it's tough to run a lot of Duke's current system with Zoubek in there. But if he can give Duke a big body to use situationally, that's more than enough, and anything else is gravy. 2) Is Dave McClure actually healthy? I really don't think so. In fact, I'm almost positive that we'll find out that he never fully recovered from his off-season surgery. He's playing as hard as always, but his rebounding and help D are not as sharp as last year. We really need him off the bench, given our lack of post depth. Can Dave step up? Is he healthy enough to do so?

    And, just to keep the tradition alive...
    Can we get the ball to Scheyer more, and let him work up top, rather than sticking him in the corner?
    One of these posts wouldn't feel right without adding that.

    As always, there are other issues. But I feel like some have been solved and others just can't be at this point. Let's see how these shake out over the next nine games.

  2. #2
    I love the 10-0 record. Great stuff. i think to make this team exceptional the big guys must continue to improve. If LT plays like he did last night, we'll be in great shape. Zoubek returning will be key.

    I have been extremely pleased with the guards.

    This team has far exceded my expectations it is unbelievable.

    GO DUKE!!!

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
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    Louisville, KY

    Henderson

    Quote Originally Posted by Jumbo View Post
    Can Duke's free throw shooting improve?Duke is not an awful free-throw shooting team. 69% at the college level isn't good, but it's not horrible. And Duke has four excellent FT shooters to go to late in games -- Scheyer, Paulus, Smith and Singler. The real issue is Nelson and Henderson. They get to the line more than anyone, and they handle the ball a lot. I've come to accept that as a senior with a funky release, Nelson can't be expected to do much better than 64.5%, although I can hope for some improvement. But Gerald is an enigma. The kid has a nice-lookng, fluid stroke. There is absolutely no reason he should be shooting 61.1%.
    Does anyone else get the impression he isn't yet comfortable in his own skin? He seems like he knows he has HUGE potential but may even be scared of tapping into it. The kid is just what, 20?, and I know I didn't have a flippin' clue about myself then and was full of self-doubt. I think by the end of his junior year, he will have scouts convinced he's the second coming of Grant Hill. He just has to come to personal grips with that, and I strongly suspect last season's much publicized Duke-relative disappointment had an impact he is still wrestling with to define his own basketball personna, much the same way I believe Greg's phenomenal year is directly correlated to his struggles with last season's team.

    No, I'm not a psychologist and don't pretend to have such insights, but I just get a vibe from the guy that the only thing holding him back is his belief in himself. Gerald, you got game. Now go get what's yours.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
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    Walnut Creek, California

    Nelson and FTs

    It seems to me that DeMarcus has improved his FT shooting over the past few games. He was 6-7 against the Heels. I haven't looked further back, but I believe you'll see a better than 70% rate for the past three or four games.

    Against UNC he was money in the last few minutes of the game. Ball handling, too.

    I know -- past performance is not not indicative of future performance, but something is happening with him that is very positive.

  5. #5
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    Portland, OR
    Quote Originally Posted by Jim3k View Post
    I haven't looked further back, but I believe you'll see a better than 70% rate for the past three or four games.
    Nelson is 28-39 over the last 4 games... that's 71.8%.
    Last edited by -jk; 02-08-2008 at 07:38 AM. Reason: Fix quote tag. Use the Preview button.

  6. #6
    I would add that we can definitely get better during end of half - end of game situations. We have done OK. I've always thought it better to dribble the ball down the court, when you can, as opposed to waiting for a double team that is invariably hard to see over & hard to anticipate where/when the defensive player is going to jump the route to the intended recipient of the pass. I know others will likely disagree - just my two cents.

    I love this team from so many different perspectives, so this is really a wish list item.

  7. #7

    LT and Singler and Z o my

    Our inside play has been improving lately, or better put, production from our inside players. Kyle Singler is becoming a beast. He recorded a double-double in his first rivalry game against a guy having one of the hugest rivalry games ever. Great opening salvo from KS and hopefully to be repeated continuously against the holes.
    I am stoked on the play of Lance lately, he played like this occasionally last year and had yet to put together an excellent game in a while, but has been playing solid ball for a while strait. What I like is the consistency and that the quality is also improving.
    I am not convinced that Z will bring anything to this team for this year. An occasional sighting but i´m not thinking he´ll produce much. Plus the risk to his foot, i´d say just keep him out for the rest of the year.

  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by juise View Post
    Nelson is 28-39 over the last 4 games... that's 71.8%.

    I'd like to see his stats in the last 7 or 8 minutes of a game, because it seemed to me that he hit the big ones at crunch time.

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jumbo View Post
    Can we advance from beating teams to dominating them?
    Going back to last year I think we tended to get out to big leads more often. Followed by stall ball, other team starts scoring, we lost.

    I tend to like the pace of the games this year in reference to scoring differential. We're not blowing teams out as much as we are solidly beating them. In the ACC thats enough for me. The only negative aspect I see with this is it takes a lot out of the guys. I wonder if 'closer' games all year will affect our legs come tournament time.

  10. #10

    Thanks Jumbo

    Love these recap/forecasts!
    Foul shooting, staying out of foul trouble and more ball movement would be my 3 top priorities.

    The team shoots well, plays great defense, gives great effort and clearly enjoy playing together. I think down the road a dominant big man may give us trouble (please, no Michael Beasley!!!!), but those players are few and far between in college hoops.

    As an aside, I think this team is tailor made for the slow down portion of the game - sonmething in the past I think led to problems protecting the lead. So many good ball handlers and slashers now.

  11. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by dbb03 View Post
    I think down the road a dominant big man may give us trouble (please, no Michael Beasley!!!!), but those players are few and far between in college hoops.
    We just beat a team with a top 5 big man.

  12. #12
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    Raleigh, NC
    Quote Originally Posted by bluedev_92 View Post
    I would add that we can definitely get better during end of half - end of game situations. We have done OK.
    As I read Jumbo's first post and his first point about dominating vs beating the first thing that crossed my mind is that we need to finish the half strong. We have not done OK in this regard IMHO. The UNC game is yet another example of not finishing the first half strong. I've seen some great Duke teams that use the half as a great separator. We would be up by say 7 points in a hard fought first half. Then we'd pour it on at the end of the half, extend the lead to say 12 and get to the locker room before the other team could lessen the lead. Then we would start the second half strong and all of a sudden teams would look up and be down 18 and would be trying to figure out what happened.

    This year we seem to play great and build 7-12 point leads in the first half. Then we finish the half weakly and go into halftime with about a 3 point lead. Then we have often started the second half slowly. We do, however, finish the second half strong which is important.

    I'm very happy with this team and we are 20-1 so let's keep this in perspective but improving around half time is something I think we can improve to go from winning to dominating.

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by pamtar View Post
    We just beat a team with a top 5 big man.
    oh, i know. i'm just saying if/when we lose it will be because of one or more of the factors i listed.

    hopefully, i am wrong.

    btw, hansborough is no michael beasley, IMO.

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by dbb03 View Post
    btw, hansborough is no michael beasley, IMO.
    Very true, they should call him Beastly.

  15. #15
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    NC
    Quote Originally Posted by dbb03 View Post
    Love these recap/forecasts!
    Foul shooting, staying out of foul trouble and more ball movement would be my 3 top priorities.

    The team shoots well, plays great defense, gives great effort and clearly enjoy playing together. I think down the road a dominant big man may give us trouble (please, no Michael Beasley!!!!), but those players are few and far between in college hoops.

    As an aside, I think this team is tailor made for the slow down portion of the game - sonmething in the past I think led to problems protecting the lead. So many good ball handlers and slashers now.
    I think it will take a team with very effective big man, a top-tier point guard, and good shooters. Again, there are very few of those teams out there that have all three. UCLA and Kansas come to mind.

  16. #16
    Will Lance Thomas' improvement be linear, or is it a blip?
    One thing to keep in mind about Lance is that his season has been frequently interrupted by injuries and illness. He had that ankle injury back in December, and then was out with a mysterious "respiratory illness" in January. From what I've seen of Lance this year, I think his footwork and ability to make himself available for an entry pass in the post are much improved (due at least in part to his work with John Lucas over the summer). I suspect that if Lance had been able to get more consistent playing time this year, people may have noticed this improvement sooner rather than the last few games.

    Of course, I could be (and often am) wrong. And obviously he's got a way to go, particularly with finishing strong around the rim. It would be nice to have a guy who, when our guards penetrate and draw help defenders, can move to the basket, catch passes, and finish. Right now we're obviously doing lot of drive and kick, which is clearly working great. But variety is the spice of...basketball. Or something like that.

  17. #17
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Durham (3 blocks from Lax house!)

    Opening the Can of Arse Whoopin

    Regarding drubbing teams instead of just beating them, I have had a lingering thought this season. It seems to me that Duke has at times been able to establish a 10 - 15 pt lead in the 1st halves of games, but then has not been able to extend that lead into the "arse whoopin'" zone (obviously there are some exceptions to this, notably State and Maryland, where we came from behind). In musing about why this might be happening, I thought that it may be due to the fact that teams are initially somewhat baffled by Dukes great pressure defense and spread out offense. During this time of bafflement, a lead is established. Then, teams seem to sort of figure out how to run some offense on us and somewhat adjust to our spread offense. During this period, teams have played us fairly evenly. So what's the point? I wonder whether we might have some tighter games in this upcoming stretch when we play teams that we have already played before and who understand to a certain extent what it takes to remain competetive with Duke. To combat this familiarity, I think we should play stallball on offense for the entire game, and a nice 2:3 zone on D with Zoubek starting at center.

    Thoughts?

    maltedone

  18. #18
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    Sep 2007
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    Posh is my favorite variety of Spice.

  19. #19
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    Feb 2007
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    Raleigh, NC

    Re: LT

    A friend of mine was a little down on Lance at the beginning of the season. What I see in Lance is a pretty good ball player that has made some improvement this year, that hustles, and all that. But the other thing that I see in Lance is an amazing amount of potential. I told my friend, "You can write this down, Lance Thomas will be a beast by the time he's a senior". I still believe that and watching him play against UNC the other night is exactly why I still believe it. He's really quick for his size and as he continues to improve...look out!

  20. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by Jumbo View Post


    Whither Duke's health?
    Obviously, Duke can't afford injuries to key guys. But within this category are two key questions. 1) Zoubek apparently will return, but in what shape? And isn't there a major risk of injuring his foot again? And, if he is back, can Duke find a way to utilize him? For the most part, it's tough to run a lot of Duke's current system with Zoubek in there. But if he can give Duke a big body to use situationally, that's more than enough, and anything else is gravy. 2) Is Dave McClure actually healthy? I really don't think so. In fact, I'm almost positive that we'll find out that he never fully recovered from his off-season surgery. He's playing as hard as always, but his rebounding and help D are not as sharp as last year. We really need him off the bench, given our lack of post depth. Can Dave step up? Is he healthy enough to do so?

    Re: Lance -- Just an outstanding game this week. His offense and post defense gave a glimpse of how good he could be. However, I think his main value is outside the post, pressuring opposing bigs when they get the ball at the top of the key and doing a great job on opposing guards trying to run off screens. His greatest asset is his agility, and this has been absolutely critical to the ball-pressure defense that has been so successful recently. What will happen when Zoubek starts coming in for a few minutes and the D loses that pressure? Zoubek has great potential, but this year's team has to play to its strengths, and Lance fits so well right now.

    And Dave... he was my favorite player on last year's team. I have immense respect for his basketball IQ. I see him as good as Scheyer in that regard. In my opinion, he is not physically able to take advantage of his abilities right now.

    This season is such an enjoyable ride!

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