Duke 75, Ga Tech 68 Post Game Thread

[CDu]

Worth reiterating: we had a fantastic backcourt duo and a fantastic frontcourt duo tonight. Goldwire and Steward combined for 30 points (on just 19 FGA and 8-8 FT), 10 assists, 10 rebounds, 3 steals, 1 block, and just one turnover. They were phenomenal. Hurt and Johnson struggled for the first half, but came up big in the second. They combined for 35 points (on 22 FGA), 14 rebounds, 3 steals, and 2 blocks.

Goldwire had such a great game. Probably the best game of his career. He made only a couple of mistakes all night. Effective on both ends.

Steward had a monster first half, but still had a decent second half. He took good shots, and it was nice to see some 3s fall. He kind of got lost when Alvarado switched onto him, but a terrific game overall.

Hurt was a stud shooting the ball. Water is wet. His ability to score in a variety of ways is such a weapon. I am excited to see what he can do next with...

Johnson. What can you say? He can be at times maddening, but his second half showed how talented he is. He was easily the best player of the floor, making big plays on both ends repeatedly down the stretch.

[mkirsh]

So, the biggest question of the night... did anyone figure out what Hurt had stuck in his waistband?

Ha! Looked like he stuffed his phone in his shorts but I think it was the inside of the tag on the bottom of the jersey

[Kedsy]

Before the game, Coach K made a big deal about getting to the line on offense and not putting them on the line on defense, and you gotta love a team that listens. The effort felt different, watching the game, and it shows in the defensive stats, at least.

OFFENSE

Possessions: 71.9 (decent pace for us; a little faster than our KenPom adjusted season average, but not too much)
oRtg: 1.04 (1.09 adjusted; after three straight games with an unadjusted oRtg of 0.98 or worse, we'll take the small success; adjusted, it's the equivalent of #65 in the country)
eFG%: 49.1% (not so hot)
3pt%: 31.3% (about average for this group, not good for almost anyone else)
2pt%: 50.0% (not great, but not awful, either)
%threes: 27.6% (after four straight games in which 40% or more of our shots were three-pointers, we finally got our itchy trigger fingers under control)
FT rate: 37.9% (now we're talking; you could tell the players were trying to put themselves in position to get fouled, and they were rewarded with our 2nd-best FTR performance of the season)
OR%: 32.4% (not great, but better than in any of our losses)
TO%: 19.5% (too high, but not as bad as last game)
a/to: 1.14:1
%assisted: 61.5% (strong)
fast break pts: 15 (20.0% of points; acceptable, maybe a little better than that)

DEFENSE

dRtg: 0.95 (0.85 adjusted; after seven straight unadjusted dRtgs over 1.04, we finally had a really good game on defense; adjusted, it's the equivalent of #1 in the nation)
eFG%: 50.0% (not great, 8th straight game with an eFG% of 50% or better)
3pt%: 33.3% (we'll take it; they hit a circus three, missed two or three rushed ones at the end and missed a bunch of wide open treys early on, but I guess that's the luck factor everybody's been talking about)
2pt%: 50.0% (8th straight game in which our opponents shot 50% or better from two)
%threes: 37.5% (a bit high, but it didn't hurt us too much)
FT rate: 7.8% (woo-hoo!!! this is fabulous, our best defensive FTR of the season by a mile)
DR%: 86.5% (I'm making the strongman pose now; our 4th DR% at 80% or better, 7th at 75% or better, and 9th at 70% or better)
TO%: 15.3% (blech; our 3rd worst defensive TO% of the season)
a/to: 1.14:1
%assisted: 53.6%
stl%: 11.1% (decent)
blk%: 4.7% (7.5% of 2pt shots) (not so good)
fast break pts: 13 (19.1% of points; disappointing)


Offense was a bit blah, but it was our best performance since Wake Forest. Defense was really good, by far our best since the 3rd game, and possibly our best defense of the season. Sure, there's still work to do, but the kids listened to their coach and did what he told them, and you really can't ask for too much more than that.

[gofurman]

So, the biggest question of the night... did anyone figure out what Hurt had stuck in his waistband?

Good win

Two takeaway. All about FT count

Also we win when the other team is better at Ô than D in kenpom. Norte Dame 20th O ranked 180 D. Gt is 20th O but 100 on D in kenpom . My numbers are rough approximations of where ken has them


So, Clemson ? Were number one D in nation!! And 80th in offense. The wrong team for us to play... But have not been the same since COVID break losing most games BAD. Lost to GT by 20 or 30. We can take Clemson but it will be vs the best D numerically we have seen. But this next is more a factor of where is Clemson mentally. They were awesome and now have crumbled. If we can jump out on them they seem to fade.

Glad to see the team take a punch and respond!!

Issues - Johnson getting picked twice by Alvarado. Cmon man - hold the ball strong so he has to foul you to take it. Those are layups live ball and killers

[Kedsy]

Williams had some really good minutes and hopefully can work his way into more PT as the bigger lineup has fewer holes. He's really disruptive in the middle with his length.

I've been hoping for some time for K to give Mark Williams more of a chance and I'm thrilled that he took advantage of that tonight. He's still needs a lot of development, but to my eyes the game didn't look too fast for him tonight and despite getting stripped once, it didn't look like he wasn't strong enough, either (though obviously he could and will get stronger). His rebounding numbers have been outstanding all season (tonight he had 18.5 rebounds per 40 minutes), and though he didn't get any blocks, he clearly altered several shots.

It may be a coincidence that the only two games in which Mark played double-figure minutes were our best two defensive performances of the season, but it may not.

[kAzE]

Great team win. It's got to feel good for those kids to get back in the win column. I love the way Jordan played down the stretch. Having a veteran in the back court was definitely an asset down the stretch of this one.

Jordan's minutes in crunch time came at the expense of Jeremy Roach, and that who I want to talk about quickly here. So far, we've seen a small, but decent sample size of Jeremy Roach at the point guard position. He's had some good games, and some bad games. This is typical for any freshman, especially a freshman point guard. However, what I've seen so far of his game doesn't appear to be someone who is a natural point guard. He's got some talent, no question, but he's been very indecisive in tight games, and his passing vision leaves a lot to be desired.

There have been several examples of this in the past several games, but the play that sticks out for me in this particular game is the horns set we ran late in the 2nd half. Jeremy is at the top of the key, with screens on the left and the right from Jalen and another player. Jeremy takes the Jalen screen to the left, Jalen cuts inside to a wide open paint, where a lob pass would have lead to an easy dunk, but instead, Jeremy doesn't see it and swings it back up to the top. I believe he was subbed out shortly after that play and did not return to the game. I was a bit wary, considering he averaged just 2.8 assists during his senior year of high school, but I came into this season with an open mind. He's now averaging around that same mark during his freshman year at Duke after this Georgia Tech game.

I just want to be clear, I am absolutely not trying to be overly critical of the kid, because of course, it's his 11th college game. He will get better. And I expect him to improve as a point guard. I just want to point out the fact that to this point in the season, for me, he doesn't appear to have point guard instincts. And I'm someone who defended Trevon Duval to the death on this message board, and I still will. That guy was a dynamic point guard who made plays for his team mates with his speed and passing ability. He could not shoot at all, but that guy was a point guard. I'm not totally sure what Jeremy is. Right now, he's a very undersized slasher.

I will say, he hasn't shot the ball particularly well at all, which really hurts his ability to make plays. I hope he can string together a few games of decent to good perimeter shooting, because I think what he does reasonably well is get into the paint and score/get to the foul line. But that's not really something he can do if the defense sags off and dares him to shoot, which has been the trend lately.

[arnie]

From a fan perspective, this season is more fun when we win games. In past years, a close win over GaT is ho-hum cause we assume Duke wasn’t motivated or up. Now, we don’t expect to win against average ACC teams and when we do ⭐️⭐️⭐️. Reminds me a little of the early K years and mid-70s; although we certainly weren’t this good back then.

Also think K starts limiting his rotation with Baker and Roach losing minutes. Think Mark Williams will likely play more particularly against the Cheats. Not sure of Brakefield’s role with Jalen available.

[SouthernDukie]

A lot of props going to the front court duo of Hurt/Johnson- and rightfully so. But I’m surprised no one has mentioned how and why that duo was able to dominate in the second half. One simple reason: no more silly fouls by JJ in that half, allowing him to stay on the court. That was huge! He played great D, but without the unnecessary reach-ins that lead to foul trouble. I cannot stress how important that was.

Fantastic games by Steward and our senior, Goldwire. They both were on their games tonight.

And you have to give a shout out to Williams, who definitely took a step forward tonight. Loved seeing him get some extended minutes and making those minutes count on both ends.

I also thought our man-to-man was much better tonight. Sure, there were still lapses. But there were also decisive choices on switches, especially on the perimeter. I thought we did well there.

So nice to see Coach K animated at the end of the game! He knew how important this win was for this young team.

Go Duke!

[Saratoga2]

I was wondering at about 10 minutes into the second half and with Goldwire, Moore and Williams in the game, where our scoring would come from. The game pace was fast at the time and we had just given up our lead. Turns out that lineup was in for defense but then Jalen came back in and our front court scoring made the difference. Williams looks like he can get a lot better with more PT and he does give up inside presence.

[DukieInBrasil]

We had 3 great performers in the same game, and we needed all of it from each of them. J-Gold cemented, in my mind at least, that he is the team's PG. Roach could become a fine player but he's not a good PG. Also, Wendell Moore needs to never touch the ball again on offense if he's not cutting to the basket: he's a terrible shooter, his passes are weak, and he needlessly dribbles the ball around to pass it to someone who is not in a position to score. At least he finally found enough awareness to not drive recklessly into the lane just to turn it over, and he still led the team in turns with 4.
Although Mark Williams didn't counter Wright pt for pt, i think he was a solid answer to their best post player. Wright got a bit flustered in the 2nd half and ended up shooting poorly overall.
I wish this Duke team had someone like Alvarado. J-Gold comes closest, at least in intensity and team-play awareness, but he is not nearly the offensive player that JA is. Kudos to him, and Wright as well, for turning into excellent collegiate players. They'll both play pro for a while overseas, if they want.

[Daddylawman]

I agree with a lot of the observations here - a win heals a lot of wounds, but there were several times in the second half when I thought "If this shot goes in, it's the dagger" and we didn't hit. We are going to need to hit 3's to win games consistently against good opponents. I am looking forward to seeing Williams after a year in the weight room, 7 feet and strong will make up for other shortcomings. In my opinion, the freshman are just getting to the point where they would have been in November in a normal year. Instead of practices, they are having to learn a lot in games. We will only get better.

[dukelifer]

We had 3 great performers in the same game, and we needed all of it from each of them. J-Gold cemented, in my mind at least, that he is the team's PG. Roach could become a fine player but he's not a good PG. Also, Wendell Moore needs to never touch the ball again on offense if he's not cutting to the basket: he's a terrible shooter, his passes are weak, and he needlessly dribbles the ball around to pass it to someone who is not in a position to score. At least he finally found enough awareness to not drive recklessly into the lane just to turn it over, and he still led the team in turns with 4.
Although Mark Williams didn't counter Wright pt for pt, i think he was a solid answer to their best post player. Wright got a bit flustered in the 2nd half and ended up shooting poorly overall.
I wish this Duke team had someone like Alvarado. J-Gold comes closest, at least in intensity and team-play awareness, but he is not nearly the offensive player that JA is. Kudos to him, and Wright as well, for turning into excellent collegiate players. They'll both play pro for a while overseas, if they want.

Roach has ability but he is struggling right now. This is the life of a normal Freshman. Nolan Smith started his career very slowly and became ACC player of the year. At some point it clicks. Right now- Hurt, a focused Johnson, and a little more disciplined Steward, and Goldwire may be enough. It would be great if Moore could be better offensive player. Not sure it will happen this year - but not impossible.

[BlueDevilStop]

Game recap.

Six observations.

A difficult choice for player of the game.


https://bluedevilstop.com/duke-ends-...-georgia-tech/

[CDu]

Before the game, Coach K made a big deal about getting to the line on offense and not putting them on the line on defense, and you gotta love a team that listens. The effort felt different, watching the game, and it shows in the defensive stats, at least.

OFFENSE

Possessions: 71.9 (decent pace for us; a little faster than our KenPom adjusted season average, but not too much)
oRtg: 1.04 (1.09 adjusted; after three straight games with an unadjusted oRtg of 0.98 or worse, we'll take the small success; adjusted, it's the equivalent of #65 in the country)
eFG%: 49.1% (not so hot)
3pt%: 31.3% (about average for this group, not good for almost anyone else)
2pt%: 50.0% (not great, but not awful, either)
%threes: 27.6% (after four straight games in which 40% or more of our shots were three-pointers, we finally got our itchy trigger fingers under control)
FT rate: 37.9% (now we're talking; you could tell the players were trying to put themselves in position to get fouled, and they were rewarded with our 2nd-best FTR performance of the season)
OR%: 32.4% (not great, but better than in any of our losses)
TO%: 19.5% (too high, but not as bad as last game)
a/to: 1.14:1
%assisted: 61.5% (strong)
fast break pts: 15 (20.0% of points; acceptable, maybe a little better than that)

DEFENSE

dRtg: 0.95 (0.85 adjusted; after seven straight unadjusted dRtgs over 1.04, we finally had a really good game on defense; adjusted, it's the equivalent of #1 in the nation)
eFG%: 50.0% (not great, 8th straight game with an eFG% of 50% or better)
3pt%: 33.3% (we'll take it; they hit a circus three, missed two or three rushed ones at the end and missed a bunch of wide open treys early on, but I guess that's the luck factor everybody's been talking about)
2pt%: 50.0% (8th straight game in which our opponents shot 50% or better from two)
%threes: 37.5% (a bit high, but it didn't hurt us too much)
FT rate: 7.8% (woo-hoo!!! this is fabulous, our best defensive FTR of the season by a mile)
DR%: 86.5% (I'm making the strongman pose now; our 4th DR% at 80% or better, 7th at 75% or better, and 9th at 70% or better)
TO%: 15.3% (blech; our 3rd worst defensive TO% of the season)
a/to: 1.14:1
%assisted: 53.6%
stl%: 11.1% (decent)
blk%: 4.7% (7.5% of 2pt shots) (not so good)
fast break pts: 13 (19.1% of points; disappointing)


Offense was a bit blah, but it was our best performance since Wake Forest. Defense was really good, by far our best since the 3rd game, and possibly our best defense of the season. Sure, there's still work to do, but the kids listened to their coach and did what he told them, and you really can't ask for too much more than that.

As always, thanks for tabulating these Kedsy. A couple of comments based on this:

1. When the defensive TO% looks blech, it's important to note that Tech doesn't turn it over. They are a top-25 team in that regard, averaging just 11% turnover rate. So that 15% is actually a pretty solid performance against them.

2. Conversely, Tech forces a turnover rate of over 21%, so 19.5% was a slightly better than expected number.

3. The offensive rebound % would be top-60 nationally on average, and is right in line with our season average (32.3%). However, given how bad Tech is at defensive rebounding (165th nationally), we probably should have done better here. That said, the defensive numbers were terrific. Tech is a bad offensive rebounding team (275th) and we are surprisingly a pretty solid defensive rebounding team (64th), so it's nice to see us play to form and then some on that end.

4. In terms of adjusted efficiency margin, last night's performance was roughly equal to the 10th best team in the country. I will take that for sure.

In aggregate, it was exactly what this team needed: a hard-fought win against a comparable opponent, in which the team faced some adversity and overcame it. Hopefully this gives them confidence as they head into the middle portion of the schedule. The next several games are all VERY winnable, and we will want to load up on wins now as the back end is a bit tougher.

[Acymetric]

MOTM=JGold 'cuz Alvarado didn't score 40.

(kidding, sort of)

Goldwire is MotM for me. Huge steal on Alvarado at the end, huge rebound on the Hurt missed FT, great pass to Jalen for an and-1, and some timely offense and FTs.

Speaking of MotM...do we not do the MotM polls any more?

[jv001]

PLAYER PTS. FGA/M 3A/M ASSTS TOs REBS STLS BLKS +/-

Moore 4 1-5 0-0 3 4 4 0 0 -2
JJ 18 7-11 0-1 2 3 6 3 2 +10
Hurt 17 6-11 1-4 2 3 8 0 0 +7
DJ 19 5-12 3-6 3 0 5 1 1 +7
Roach 0 0-3 0-3 0 2 1 1 0 +3
Goldwire 11 4-7 1-1 7 1 5 2 0 +13
Williams 6 3-6 0-0 0 1 6 1 0 -3

Baker, Brakefield and Coleman had 7 minutes combined. Brakefield had 2 rebounds and Coleman had 1 rebound. Baker had no points and 1 turnover. All were 0 +/-
Team had 43 rebounds with 14 offensive. Williams led the way with 3 offensive rebounds. Duke out rebounded GT 43-28.

[uh_no]

I've been hoping for some time for K to give Mark Williams more of a chance and I'm thrilled that he took advantage of that tonight. He's still needs a lot of development, but to my eyes the game didn't look too fast for him tonight and despite getting stripped once, it didn't look like he wasn't strong enough, either (though obviously he could and will get stronger). His rebounding numbers have been outstanding all season (tonight he had 18.5 rebounds per 40 minutes), and though he didn't get any blocks, he clearly altered several shots.

It may be a coincidence that the only two games in which Mark played double-figure minutes were our best two defensive performances of the season, but it may not.

I'm skeptical of Mark's ability to execute to those standards against bigger stronger teams. So from that perspective, his adjusted numbers are great because he has been limited to minutes in which he can succeed, instead of suggesting that he should play more.

I'm not saying he SHOULDN'T play more, and I think he will be a critical piece on future teams, and maybe even this year...but I also don't think I can confidently say that last night's game was a revelation or anything.

[bluenorth]

Some random thoughts about the game as viewed from my couch: Goldwire was certainly key to the win. After getting burned by Alvarado by leaving him to help elsewhere, Goldwire clearly had orders to stay with him and only him. He executed that order very well and negated a player who could have taken over the game.

Johnson continues to evolve. After Alvarado picked his pocket twice, he just dug a bit deeper and came up with big plays. I'd still like to see him get stronger with the ball though - protect that round thing at both ends of the court. Also, very late in the game he seemed to be trying to pump up Hurt (it may be after Hurt missed a free throw). That's the sign of a good teammate.

Is Coach K limping? Hard to tell as most of his camera time is when he's seated. But both last night and during the previous game it seemed to me that when he was leaving the court his stride was a bit off. Hopefully I'm wrong and his knees, hips etc aren't troubling him.

Nice to see Williams get some positive minutes. Having his shot blocked a couple of times will reinforce that he can't take anything for granted at this level. It sounds like he's willing to put in the work to improve so hopefully he is rewarded with more playing time.

Next game!

[Phredd3]

I'm skeptical of Mark's ability to execute to those standards against bigger stronger teams. So from that perspective, his adjusted numbers are great because he has been limited to minutes in which he can succeed, instead of suggesting that he should play more.

I'm not saying he SHOULDN'T play more, and I think he will be a critical piece on future teams, and maybe even this year...but I also don't think I can confidently say that last night's game was a revelation or anything.

I disagree with this a bit. He played more aggressively than he has in the past last night, and while that didn't always turn out well, it showed a certain level of confidence that I haven't seen before.

I do think there are a couple things he still needs a lot of work on, of course. One of those is the way he contests shots. I thought he was instrumental in bothering GT's shots, even though he didn't get any blocks. But he has a disturbing tendency to swipe his arm all the way down through, which is going to get him shooting fouls when we play better teams. He especially needs to avoid that against a group like the team down the road. He'll be better off going up and keeping his arm fully extended.

The other main thing he still needs to add is strength in the post, particularly in rebounding (which is your bigger, stronger comment, basically). He did have a number of good rebounds, but he also had a couple times where he should have had a rebound but lost the ball before he could corral it. That doesn't show up directly in the stat sheet, but it certainly matters for the team. And he had I think a couple of occasions where he brought the ball down too low after grabbing the ball. As I recall (but my memory is known to be flawed), one of those led to a strip, and one of them resulted in a tie-up with Duke retaining possession (so not counting as a turnover).

But overall, I thought his play was much improved on both ends of the floor. It's still TBD on how revelatory his improvement is, of course, but I think last night's game was at the least an important incremental improvement, and could end up as a big confidence booster for a player who up until now has seen mostly unsuccessful, short game time.

[dukelifer]

Some random thoughts about the game as viewed from my couch: Goldwire was certainly key to the win. After getting burned by Alvarado by leaving him to help elsewhere, Goldwire clearly had orders to stay with him and only him. He executed that order very well and negated a player who could have taken over the game.

Johnson continues to evolve. After Alvarado picked his pocket twice, he just dug a bit deeper and came up with big plays. I'd still like to see him get stronger with the ball though - protect that round thing at both ends of the court. Also, very late in the game he seemed to be trying to pump up Hurt (it may be after Hurt missed a free throw). That's the sign of a good teammate.

Is Coach K limping? Hard to tell as most of his camera time is when he's seated. But both last night and during the previous game it seemed to me that when he was leaving the court his stride was a bit off. Hopefully I'm wrong and his knees, hips etc aren't troubling him.

Nice to see Williams get some positive minutes. Having his shot blocked a couple of times will reinforce that he can't take anything for granted at this level. It sounds like he's willing to put in the work to improve so hopefully he is rewarded with more playing time.

Next game!

Yes- K is limping. A combination of age and aging hardware. He had hip replacement more than 20 years ago and then his knees more recently. Not sure if the hips may need new hardware at some point.