Man of the Match vs. Florida State (ACC Tourney)

[Jumbo]

Who was the Man of the Match in the ACC Tourney game against Florida State?

[FerryFor50]

Scheyer, but only closely over Gerald.

[Jumbo]

Scheyer, but only closely over Gerald.

Scheyer, and not close. Every decision was right. Imagine if he'd got a couple more foul calls on his drives and the three where he got hit in the first half? No bad shots, great passes. G was terrific, but forced a few plays. Jon was -- and has been for the last month -- fantastic!

[Bob Green]

Jon Scheyer gets my vote. FSU refused to fold and Scheyer was money from the free throw line.

[davekay1971]

Kudos to several guys today:

Scheyer was probably MOTM, but Gerald was dominant in stretches. Kyle was key in getting the big advantage in the first half. Nolan continues to play really well recovering from his injury. McClure had so many great plays. Great game, great win.

[CameronBornAndBred]

Jon Scheyer! That one shot that he just tossed up there from underneath...lol!

Big Man shoutout to Brian Zoubek, his D today was huge.

[pamtar]

Jon was ice again. MVP today and overall.

[juise]

I loved Jon's game today and thought his free throws were huge down the stretch (especially the one where he got fouled on a three when FSU had cut the lead to 7). However, I thought that Kyle did everything well in the first half and was instrumental in building the lead. He had some huge rebounds, a big block, and hit a string of threes to bring the lead to double digits. Kyle gets my vote.

[Chard]

Scheyer for sure.

Gonna savor this one for a while. Great weekend of play by the team.

[devildeac]

Jon-outstanding the entire game. G was very good but had some bad decisions, too.

[Ignatius07]

Scheyer, and not close. Every decision was right. Imagine if he'd got a couple more foul calls on his drives and the three where he got hit in the first half? No bad shots, great passes. G was terrific, but forced a few plays. Jon was -- and has been for the last month -- fantastic!

I thought it was close as well but voted for Scheyer. Duke counts on Gerald to make more fantastic plays than it does from Scheyer, but really all of the big 3 had a huge tournament. Nolan Smith also played great.

Edit: Zoubek was also great today!

[Billy Dat]

Aside from Scheyer's fantastic leadership and poise, he scored 11 and assisted on another 3 pointer during the decisive run when they had cut it to 6. The kid is a gamer...love him!

[Madrasdukie]

I did think about G, but it was clearly Jon. There were some plays by G that appeared that he could have used slightly better judgement (even remember the one play at the end of the game that made Coach K stomp his foot).

[BlueintheFace]

Jon by a mile. G played well, but made lots of bad decision. Jon is on a roll and I hope he just keeps rolling.

[OldSchool]

Could have gone with Jon or Gerald for spectacular offense.

However, I am going with Kyle for defense. The man played 40 minutes in EACH of the three tournament games.

FSU is the biggest team in Division I. It was shocking that the talented senior forward Echefu had ZERO points in this game. Singleton had some big outside shots, but next to nothing inside. And together with Lance, Brian and Dave, just what an amazing job on FSU's bigs inside.

Iron man!

[DukeUsul]

I'm gonna go outside the lines here and pick Brian. Scheyer, Henderson and Singler were fantastic, but Brian's first-half D was critical to us getting a big lead. Not sure what would have happened if FSU got on a roll inside.

[roywhite]

Three Duke players on the All-ACC Tournament team, Jon Scheyer as ACC Tournament MVP, and Duke as ACC Tournament Champions.

Life as it should be. :):)

[micah75]

I'm loving Jon's game. He has a way of growing on you. I have to admit that Greg has been my favorite player the past few seasons, and still is, but Jon may very well be my new fave before this season's said and done. Great game all around by Jon. He plays with such poise... and it's no fluke that he seems to find a way to make a "circus" shot once a game as of late. He makes things happen and plays with authority. Can you ask for a better playmaker? Hmm? Can you? Didn't think so. ;)

[DukeDevilDeb]

... the whole team!!!!!!! Jon was incredible today, and his leadership has really shined through these last 9 games. He is my MOTM today as he was yesterday.

That said, the crown doesn't become ours without G, without Kyle, without Dave, without Nolan, without Brian, without Elliott... well, I could go on and on. These three games have been the best three games we've played all year. In the first two, offense was hard to come by, but defense was spectacular. In today's game, our three-point shooting in the first half nearly put the lights out in the Georgia Dome. But DEFENSE again was what finally won out. Echefu with 0 points; Kitchen with 0 points... we outrebounded them.

No other way to say it than WE ARE CHAMPIONS!

Congrats to the team and coaches! GO DUKE! :):):)

[diesel]

I voted for Scheyer, but beside the other usual suspects (Henderson, Singler), I was highly impressed with the play of both Nolan Smith and Brian Zoubek.

[MarkD83]

The whole team, coaches, managers, etc deserve MOTM.

ACC Championships are won by everyone.

[jpfrizzle]

The whole team, coaches, managers, etc deserve MOTM.

ACC Championships are won by everyone.

This is true, I do agree.

[Jim3k]

I voted for Jon, but a legitimate case can be made for Zoubek. His presence changed the entire tenor of the game. Until he entered, Adabi was having his way up front. After Zoubek came in, he changed Adabi's shots, blocking one and then began scooping up offensive rebounds. Six rebounds in 9 minutes, four of which were offensive.

It became obvious to Hamilton that Adabi could not control the boards with Zoubek's play. That meant that Hamilton had to go smaller. His decision played into Duke's strengths. We'd much rather play smaller and quicker. We have an overall speed and quickness advantage (Douglas not withstanding). Our guards are, on the whole, better. And no FSU forward can handle Singler on on one.

Once Hamilton decided to go small, we had them. We might have had them anyway, but Zoubs is more problematical over the long haul, so I'm not entirely sure about that.

If you measure by total playing time, Scheyer is the clear overall MOP. But if you look to the impact one player's special role had, Zoubek can't be overlooked.

Edit: One of the reasons for Hamilton's dismay must have been Adabi's dumb foul on Zoubek, coming over his back near the foul line. Adabi should never have been out there. Zoubek had spooked him.

[mgtr]

I voted for Scheyer, although as others have posted, G and Kyle were right up there. And I agree that Zoubs stepped up big time. I think that Nolan is in better form than before the concussion. Is that possible? He made two great trips to the hoop, and good old Greg made one. Dave didn't have the offensive game he had last night, but he made some great defensive plays. Overall, a wonderful team effort. This may be covered elsewhere, but I would have been very sad if any of the three legs of our stool were left off the all-tournament team.

[Les Grossman]

29 points and handled the ball like a first rate PG. HIs drive to the hoop and spin-in, in traffic, was outstanding.

[Son of Mojo]

I gave it to G but Scheyer was right there & made me do a cursor-twitch. Jon did easily deserve the MVP for what he did the whole tourney.

[ACCBBallFan]

Several guys played well, but Jon was the best

Rating Player-Pos

88 Jon Scheyer, G

81 Toney Douglas, G
80 Gerald Henderson, G-F

74 Chris Singleton, F
60 Kyle Singler, F

54 TOTALS-Duke
45 TOTALS-FSU

37 Solomon Alabi, C
37 Nolan Smith, G

33 Ryan Reid, F
32 Luke Loucks, G
32 Lance Thomas, F

27 Jordan DeMercy, F
23 Deividas Dulkys, G
23 David McClure, F

17 Derwin Kitchen, G
17 Brian Zoubek, C

13 Uche Echefu, F
11 Elliot Williams, G

06 Xavier Gibson, F-C
03 Greg Paulus, G
01 Brian Hoff, G

[roywhite]

Jon Scheyer was not named 1st team, 2nd team, 3rd team, or even Honorable Mention All-ACC, yet was named ACC Tournament MVP.

Wonder if that's ever happened? (I recall John Gilchrist from Maryland had a great ACC Tournament a few years ago, but no other candidates come to mind).

[ncexnyc]

It's easy to look at the numbers Jon and G put up and select one of them, but this game belongs to Brian.

I realize the man scored 0, nada, nothing, but things seemed to turn positively for Duke when he came in for Lance early in the game. His size and actual play neutralized FSU's size advantage and that was the key to this game.

[RainingThrees]

MOTM was our new pg Jon Scheyer. It was Raining Threes in Atlanta!!!!!

[Papa John]

Agree that Scheyer was MOTM against FSU, but this was a game where Singler and Gerald also both had legitimate claims... And I was actually quite surprised that Scheyer was the tourney MVP... He definitely deserved all tourney first team honors, but Kyle played lights out on both ends of the floor all weekend long and literally put us on his back a couple of times in the first two games when the fire just wasn't there with the rest of the guys... Singler deserved Tourney MVP...

[KenTankerous]

My beautiful, talented, very intelligent and driven niece stopped by on her way back to WKU from spring break and watched the game with me and my ladylove. She thinks Jon is about the cutest thing ever.

Does he have a girlfriend? If not, does he date out of conference?

Her facebook page, just in case Jon is watching:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/profile.php?id=1202820029

[Ggallagher]

I had to vote for Jon although there were outstanding contributions by Kyle, Gerald, Brian and others - however...

What really caught my attention was Jon's interview after the game. With the rest of the team celebrating in the background, and all the emotions that Jon (and others) must have been experiencing, and the Duke fans cheering for the championship, Jon was about as stone cold calm and solid as could be imagined during a somewhat lengthy interview.
Hope he went a little crazy when they took the camera off him.

THAT was focus and cool!!
Great game by the entire team!
Glen

[jv001]

My vote went to Jon. 29 pts, 4 rebs, 2 assts, 2 tos and one steal in 38 mins.
The big 3 again played exceptionally well. Good to see Gerald play the way he did. 27 pts, 4 assts, 1 blk and 1 steal. Kyle had 14 pts, 4 rebs(thought it was more), 2 assts, 0 to's and 1 steal. Keep it up guys..Go Duke!

[Highlander]

I abstain. Everyone on the team gave us exactly what we needed today, and we put together a pretty complete game. From Scheyer and Henderson pouring on the points, to Singler and McClure getting it done underneath, to Zoubs setting some great screens and rebounding, to Nolan's clutch baskets.

My vote goes to the team. The WHOLE team. Congrats on the championship guys. You earned it.

[mgtr]

I abstain. Everyone on the team gave us exactly what we needed today, and we put together a pretty complete game. From Scheyer and Henderson pouring on the points, to Singler and McClure getting it done underneath, to Zoubs setting some great screens and rebounding, to Nolan's clutch baskets.

My vote goes to the team. The WHOLE team. Congrats on the championship guys. You earned it.

Well, it must be unamimous -- this is definitely the post of the day!! Good work, Highlander.