MBB: Duke at Louisville (1/17/15 12 pm ESPN) Pre-Game & In-Game Thread

[Bob Green]

Duke (#4) heads to Louisville (#6) for a High Noon showdown on Saturday. Discuss the game here.

[weezie]

Nice place you have here Mr. Green.

Duke does well when they're hated by unwashed masses. L'ville fits the bill. I get a sense that they def want to be our rivals.

[jipops]

Louisville is 0-2 vs RPI top 25. They are not a particularly good shooting team so I hope we don't try to extend our defense out on ball handlers like Rozier and Jones. If we do we may get demolished. Let them chuck it from deep or try to feed it in to Harrell.

Offensively this could be interesting. Louisville will not need to double on Okafor so hopefully he can operate and get Harrell into foul trouble. They may not be as tough on D without him. It's very important for Jah to be physical in this one.

[SoCalDukeFan]

Playing Miami on Tuesday after NC State on Sunday did not give give the staff much time to make adjustments. Much longer break before this game.

The NC State coach and the Miami coach knew just what they needed to do to beat Duke. And they did it. Pitano certainly knows the game plan.

Duke is very talented. Hopefully a confident team shows up ready to play.

SoCal

[CDu]

Louisville is 0-2 vs RPI top 25. They are not a particularly good shooting team so I hope we don't try to extend our defense out on ball handlers like Rozier and Jones. If we do we may get demolished. Let them chuck it from deep or try to feed it in to Harrell.

Agreed. Louisville is yet another team with the components to shred our defense. Hopefully we change our approach, or hopefully they struggle.

Offensively this could be interesting. Louisville will not need to double on Okafor so hopefully he can operate and get Harrell into foul trouble. They may not be as tough on D without him. It's very important for Jah to be physical in this one.

I would be fairly surprised if Harrell guards Okafor very often. For one thing, Louisville plays a fair amount of zone. For another, Harrell plays PF and Louisville rotates a few different big guys (Onuaku and Matthiang most notably) at C. Harrell does most of his defensive damage in help defense, and I'd expect him to guard Jefferson when they go man-to-man.

[jv001]

Agreed. Louisville is yet another team with the components to shred our defense. Hopefully we change our approach, or hopefully they struggle.



I would be fairly surprised if Harrell guards Okafor very often. For one thing, Louisville plays a fair amount of zone. For another, Harrell plays PF and Louisville rotates a few different big guys (Onuaku and Matthiang most notably) at C. Harrell does most of his defensive damage in help defense, and I'd expect him to guard Jefferson when they go man-to-man.

If Louisville doubles with Harrell being the help defender, that's a good time for Amile to get some points and Jahlil to get some assists. GoDuke!

[NSDukeFan]

Agreed. Louisville is yet another team with the components to shred our defense. Hopefully we change our approach, or hopefully they struggle.



I would be fairly surprised if Harrell guards Okafor very often. For one thing, Louisville plays a fair amount of zone. For another, Harrell plays PF and Louisville rotates a few different big guys (Onuaku and Matthiang most notably) at C. Harrell does most of his defensive damage in help defense, and I'd expect him to guard Jefferson when they go man-to-man.

I don't know if Louisville is that bad a matchup with their O vs Duke's D. I expect their guards will get penetration as most quick guards do. They don't have the reputation as good perimeter shooters though, which has been a major problem the last few games. Duke has traditionally allowed quick guards to get by the perimeter defenders, but has not allowed good 3 point shooting. In the last 3 games, the team has allowed both, part of the reason for the poor defensive performance. If Duke can tighten up at the 3 point line, communicate a bit better in rotations and challenge a bit better at the rim, the team can defend well even if the opponent's guards get by our perimeter defenders (hopefully not that easily.)

[NSDukeFan]

I do expect that Louisville's D will be one of the tougher match ups for Duke's offense, because of their quick, aggressive guards putting pressure on the perimeter.

[roywhite]

Reminds me of one of the final scenes from Apollo 13 as the damaged space vehicle prepares for re-entry and the technical experts details the problems:

Henry Hurt: We've got the parachute situation, the heat shield, angle of the trajectory and the typhoon. There's just so many variables, I'm at a loss --
Chris Kraft: I know what the problems are, Henry. This could be the worst disaster NASA's ever experienced.
Gene Kranz: With all due respect, sir, I believe this is gonna be our finest hour.

I like this Duke team's chances in this situation with Mike Krzyzewski as the coach.

[CDu]

I don't know if Louisville is that bad a matchup with their O vs Duke's D. I expect their guards will get penetration as most quick guards do. They don't have the reputation as good perimeter shooters though, which has been a major problem the last few games. Duke has traditionally allowed quick guards to get by the perimeter defenders, but has not allowed good 3 point shooting. In the last 3 games, the team has allowed both, part of the reason for the poor defensive performance. If Duke can tighten up at the 3 point line, communicate a bit better in rotations and challenge a bit better at the rim, the team can defend well even if the opponent's guards get by our perimeter defenders (hopefully not that easily.)

I would agree with some hesitation. Rozier and Jones are certainly insonsistent from 3pt range (largely a function of shot selection) but both are more than capable of getting hot and raining in 3s. And while Blackshear hasn't shot it well, he is one of the better shooters out there. Each of thise guys shot over 37% from 3 last year (Blackshear pushed 40%). So if anything I would consider their low percentages this year deceiving as they may be due for some regression to the mean.

[CDu]

I do expect that Louisville's D will be one of the tougher match ups for Duke's offense, because of their quick, aggressive guards putting pressure on the perimeter.

This is absolutely correct. The Cardinals have tremendous athletes, with some great length and athleticism inside. They are well-coached and can play stifling defense. They are very disruptive. And if Harrell gets going, they can be a real handful.

[moonpie23]

i just want to see the come out hungry and aggressive.....

[dukelifer]

Jones and Justise have to regain their mojos. If they do - Duke has a chance.

[jv001]

Reminds me of one of the final scenes from Apollo 13 as the damaged space vehicle prepares for re-entry and the technical experts details the problems:

Henry Hurt: We've got the parachute situation, the heat shield, angle of the trajectory and the typhoon. There's just so many variables, I'm at a loss --
Chris Kraft: I know what the problems are, Henry. This could be the worst disaster NASA's ever experienced.
Gene Kranz: With all due respect, sir, I believe this is gonna be our finest hour.

I like this Duke team's chances in this situation with Mike Krzyzewski as the coach.

Great post, I feel better already. This post needs to be in the Optimist Thread, roywhite. GoDuke!

[jacone21]

Reminds me of one of the final scenes from Apollo 13 as the damaged space vehicle prepares for re-entry and the technical experts details the problems:

Henry Hurt: We've got the parachute situation, the heat shield, angle of the trajectory and the typhoon. There's just so many variables, I'm at a loss --
Chris Kraft: I know what the problems are, Henry. This could be the worst disaster NASA's ever experienced.
Gene Kranz: With all due respect, sir, I believe this is gonna be our finest hour.

I like this Duke team's chances in this situation with Mike Krzyzewski as the coach.

If Coach K comes out wearing a vest, Louisville is in serious trouble!

[kAzE]

i know why we lost the last 2 games...

I've been super busy over the last week and didn't catch either game live, was planning to watch replays on espn3.com... First 2 games I've missed this year.

Dont worry, I'm definitely watching the Louisville game. No freakin way we drop 3 straight. Go Duke!!

[jv001]

Our friend Al Featherston has a very good article on DBR home page regarding changes Coach K has made when things looked bleak for the Blue Devils. The changes pretty much deal with the rotation. Here are a few Al discussed:
1997- Freshman Carrawell replaced Greg Newton(not our Newton-atleast I don't think it was).
2001- Freshman Chris Duhon replaced Nate James who became a great 6th man.
2005- Coach K started Patrick Davidson against Chris Paul and Wake for one game. Duke came out really fired up and won. My Wake friends still insist that Coach K resorted to thug basketball.
2009- Freshman Elliot Williams replaced Greg Paulus.
2010- Coach K inserted Zoubs into the starting lineup in Feb and went from fast break BB to half court BB. Love how this one turned out.

Will Coach K make some kind of personnel change or will he make a change in our scheme? Or he could do nothing and just try to install confidence in the guys. I can't wait to find out. GoDuke!

[ScreechTDX1847]

Based on what I have seen in the last week I think things are going to continue to get worse before they get better. Duke loses by ~10. I think we start to improve on the other side of @UVA but still get a slim win vs. Pitt.

[MCFinARL]

Based on what I have seen in the last week I think things are going to continue to get worse before they get better. Duke loses by ~10. I think we start to improve on the other side of @UVA but still get a slim win vs. Pitt.

Okay, that's a possibility, but what is your thinking? Just a gut feeling?

[ScreechTDX1847]

Okay, that's a possibility, but what is your thinking? Just a gut feeling?

I don't think the team has hit the bottom yet and the freshman are going to have to keep getting punched in the mouth to create some grit and toughness. The next 5 contests aren't a platform to learn while you win - there are still some hard lessons. I don't see Okafor's recent issues dealing with double teams and lack of patience in the post getting better against UL.

I think this team needs to get angry and stop playing so passively - getting stomped a few times by will certainly get that going. Like K said, you have to go through this kind of adversity. If we had VT, Clemson, GT coming up I would be more optimistic but we have to be playing at a high level to get Ws out of this next run and it's hard to see it based on what I have seen. Barring a COMPLETE 180 - it's hard to envision.