next season

[Kedsy]

Maybe less recruiting of guys Duke knows are probably one and done. They may be highly recruited and very talented but if they’re only going to stay one year and there is not going to be much continuity in the program, is it worth it? There are programs like I mentioned who have players stay 3-4 years and they end up dominant. These players aren’t top 10 recruits but they are top 100 recruits who fit the systems of the school. I think Duke needs to revisit what their style and pillars are and recruit guys to fit that style and those pillars rather than use the program as a launching pad for the NBA for lots of these players that come through. It’s turning into sort of an NBA audition type program rather than recruiting guys that fit Duke as a school, team, and program.

UVa gets top 100 recruits that fit their system and at the college level, they are dominant. Huff was 74th overall and has stayed 5 years and is a dominant college player. DeAndre Hunter was 73rd and was a dominant college player. Ty Jerome was 44th, and was a dominant college player.

Of course Duke wants the most talented players and if a kid is highly ranked Duke most likely will take him. But if Duke has an indication the kid is only going to be there a year and then use the excuse and make the point that “we’re young” when they start losing games, that doesn’t sit well with me. A way to be not “young” is to recruit guys to stay and develop them and make sure they fit the program rather than adapting the style of basketball Duke plays so frequently to fit their games. There needs to be more of a balance. Right now, it seems Duke has no identity each season but they do usually have a plethora of young, talented players. Having a veteran team is important in college basketball. One way to have that is to recruit more guys you think will be around in a few years rather than the highest rated one and done recruits. A balance would be nice.

I hear you, but at this stage in his career, Coach K isn't going to become a "system" coach. Maybe after he retires the new coach will emulate Bennett or some other system coach. In the meantime, this is what we get, and to my mind there's no point complaining about it. I wish we had another three- or four-year Grant Hill or Shane Battier or Jason Williams walking through the door, but I'm resolved to the fact that it just isn't going to happen.

[throatybeard]

Duke Basketball 2022: Knocked Forward

[mkirsh]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3DeG1Dv-HM

Griffin gets a couple of buckets and a viscous two handed block against our very own Jeremy Roach in that video

[tommy]

Maybe less recruiting of guys Duke knows are probably one and done. They may be highly recruited and very talented but if they’re only going to stay one year and there is not going to be much continuity in the program, is it worth it? There are programs like I mentioned who have players stay 3-4 years and they end up dominant. These players aren’t top 10 recruits but they are top 100 recruits who fit the systems of the school. I think Duke needs to revisit what their style and pillars are and recruit guys to fit that style and those pillars rather than use the program as a launching pad for the NBA for lots of these players that come through. It’s turning into sort of an NBA audition type program rather than recruiting guys that fit Duke as a school, team, and program.

I actually think it's a strength of Coach K, and of our program, that he is flexible enough to adjust our style of play to the strengths of the players on that year's team, rather than try to jam every player into his one-and-only notion of how basketball must be played. That's what Roy does. Being flexible and nimble enough, and open-minded enough, to adjust your strategy to maximize the strengths of your team members is a sign of an excellent leader whether it be in basketball, business, or many other fields.

It also helps big time with recruiting. We don't have to tell kids how we're going to shoehorn them into our system. We can let them know, and show them, honestly, how we are going to value and utilize and maximize the skills they possess which in turn will help our team win.

UVa gets top 100 recruits that fit their system and at the college level, they are dominant. Huff was 74th overall and has stayed 5 years and is a dominant college player. DeAndre Hunter was 73rd and was a dominant college player. Ty Jerome was 44th, and was a dominant college player.

Jay Huff has made himself into a nice player, but dominant? Maybe we just define that word differently. As a senior, he's averaging 13 points and 7 rebounds, he shoots it well, and will likely make all-ACC. His career numbers are on the order of 7.6 points and 4.5 rebounds. That's not dominant in my book. DeAndre Hunter was a fine player as well, all-ACC and a high NBA draft pick after his redshirt sophomore year. So he left with two years of eligibility left. His "dominant" sophomore year he averaged 15 points and 5 rebounds. For his career at UVA it was more like 12 and 4. Again, very fine player. Dominant? Not so sure about that. And Ty Jerome didn't even make first team all-ACC in his last year. Very good college player but dominant?

Of course Duke wants the most talented players and if a kid is highly ranked Duke most likely will take him. But if Duke has an indication the kid is only going to be there a year and then use the excuse and make the point that “we’re young” when they start losing games, that doesn’t sit well with me.

That is a fair point and I agree with you on it.

A way to be not “young” is to recruit guys to stay and develop them and make sure they fit the program rather than adapting the style of basketball Duke plays so frequently to fit their games. There needs to be more of a balance. Right now, it seems Duke has no identity each season but they do usually have a plethora of young, talented players. Having a veteran team is important in college basketball. One way to have that is to recruit more guys you think will be around in a few years rather than the highest rated one and done recruits. A balance would be nice.

We don't recruit a team full of surefire one-and-dones. Not even close. What hurts isn't having Zion Williamson and Marvin Bagley and Jahlil Okafor and Jabari Parker leave after a year. We expect that and try to plan for it. What hurts our continuity and our team-building are the unexpected early departures of players we're counting on for the subsequent year(s). I don't mean the bench guys who transfer out. I mean guys like Frank Jackson and Derryck Thornton and Gary Trent, Jr. Guys we were counting on having on the team for multiple years and who in many cases we have struggled to replace on the fly. Having those types of players in the program for more like three years instead of one would do wonders for our continuity, our overall team maturity, and our leadership potential. But the reality is that these are the types of risks you run when running the model we run. You can't plan for surprise departures, and you can feel the impact of those departures for longer than might seem likely.

[mkirsh]

We don't recruit a team full of surefire one-and-dones. Not even close. What hurts isn't having Zion Williamson and Marvin Bagley and Jahlil Okafor and Jabari Parker leave after a year. We expect that and try to plan for it. What hurts our continuity and our team-building are the unexpected early departures of players we're counting on for the subsequent year(s). I don't mean the bench guys who transfer out. I mean guys like Frank Jackson and Derryck Thornton and Gary Trent, Jr. Guys we were counting on having on the team for multiple years and who in many cases we have struggled to replace on the fly. Having those types of players in the program for more like three years instead of one would do wonders for our continuity, our overall team maturity, and our leadership potential. But the reality is that these are the types of risks you run when running the model we run. You can't plan for surprise departures, and you can feel the impact of those departures for longer than might seem likely.

I'm going to be impolite and quote myself from another thread, but watching Cassius Stanley in the dunk contest tonight after reading all these posts today brought home the fact that he was not recruited as a one-and-done, and his presence on this team as a sophomore would have made a huge difference. His shooting, defense, athleticism, toughness, and fire in the backcourt could easily have pushed Duke into the upper echelon of the ACC, and made the team a potential final four contender. Just a bad break (for Duke at least) that preceded a season of bad breaks.

[TKG]

I'm going to be impolite and quote myself from another thread, but watching Cassius Stanley in the dunk contest tonight after reading all these posts today brought home the fact that he was not recruited as a one-and-done, and his presence on this team as a sophomore would have made a huge difference. His shooting, defense, athleticism, toughness, and fire in the backcourt could easily have pushed Duke into the upper echelon of the ACC, and made the team a potential final four contender. Just a bad break (for Duke at least) that preceded a season of bad breaks.

All true, mkirsh, but he is getting paid and the clock has started on that critical second contract. I think that is how the argument flows.

[mkirsh]

All true, mkirsh, but he is getting paid and the clock has started on that critical second contract. I think that is how the argument flows.

Not blaming him at all. He “over performed” his recruiting ranking and is making a living playing hoops - he probably made the right decision for himself. But when Duke was constructing the 2021 roster, while obviously nothing is given, they probably assumed Stanley would be here as the starting 2. And had he stuck around he is enough to have made a substantial difference in the season. Similar to Trent the year before and Frank Jackson the year before that.

[DarkstarWahoo]

We'll be somewhat older and more mature next year, but still one of the youngest teams in the conference and the NCAA. We have dug a deep hole with constant reliance on one year wonders to the point where our experienced players just don't match up with other teams. Somehow other schools manage to put together consistent programs without OADs. We used to. We don't.

I’ve been kind of lurking and reading and as an outsider, I think the “constant reliance on one-year players” strikes me as both a real concern and an issue that’s connected pretty closely to the grad transfer issue. On the one hand, Duke in particular seems to be the kind of program that could really benefit from the right grad transfer to mitigate times where the team is greener than expected. On the other, there aren’t a ton of good examples of grad transfers who have worked out. Have there been any one-year transfers at Duke other than Tape? I know Sean Obi wasn’t a grad transfer and that he had injury issues, but I think they both kind of ran into similar issues - that Duke didn’t recruit them out of high school for a reason. Guys like Carlik Jones who are immediately ready to make major contributions are few and far between (and it doesn’t hurt in that regard that Louisville doesn’t appear to run any systems beyond “spread the floor and take guys off the dribble”). Even my large adult son Trey Murphy, who has been an absolute wild success for an immediate-eligibility transfer, has something obvious and non-replicable to point to as a reason why he was ready to jump in levels (grew four inches in college).

The other issue is something that’s not specific to Duke, and that’s balancing the current year and the future. Present “win now” considerations aside - and I think this thread shows that a lot of fans here view those as secondary to preparing for 21-22 and beyond - when the options are a limited Patrick Tape or a raw, but much younger, Mark Williams, who is K, or any coach, going to give minutes to in the homestretch of a .500 season? He’d be crazy to curtail Williams’ development for a guy who is vanishingly unlikely to contribute to Duke in 21-22 (even factoring in the extra year). And while that’s the right call, it’s going to lead to questions for the guys who can choose between Duke and another top program - why would they go somewhere that doesn’t have a record of success with players like them?

That’s going to be an issue anywhere, but it’s something that Duke would be well-served to get a handle on, at least in the short term. There’s going to be an absolutely wild amount of player movement this off-season (I think my Wahoos are hoping to come out of it with a new frontcourt starter).

[jv001]

I'm going to be impolite and quote myself from another thread, but watching Cassius Stanley in the dunk contest tonight after reading all these posts today brought home the fact that he was not recruited as a one-and-done, and his presence on this team as a sophomore would have made a huge difference. His shooting, defense, athleticism, toughness, and fire in the backcourt could easily have pushed Duke into the upper echelon of the ACC, and made the team a potential final four contender. Just a bad break (for Duke at least) that preceded a season of bad breaks.

I agree about having Cassius on this years team and I agree players like Stanley who leave the Duke program unexpectedly creates a problem for the team. That's why I would like to see the NBA go to something like the MLB route in drafting college players. High school players can be drafted after high school upon graduation or if a drop out the player must be out of high school one year. A player can't be attending any college. College players can be drafted after their junior year or be 21 years old. I believe this would be good for players like Zion, Tatum, Ingram etc. They would be allowed to pursue their dream of playing in the NBA and not forced to go to college if they don't want to. It also helps those players that have dreamed of being an NBA player since birth but aren't Zion type players. They go to college for 3 years and are eligible for the draft. If they don't make it, they can get their degree in one year. However the NBA probably won't go this route because they have it made the way it is set up now. Another reason I don't like the NBA.

GoDuke!

[UrinalCake]

What hurts our continuity and our team-building are the unexpected early departures of players we're counting on for the subsequent year(s). I don't mean the bench guys who transfer out. I mean guys like Frank Jackson and Derryck Thornton and Gary Trent, Jr. Guys we were counting on having on the team for multiple years and who in many cases we have struggled to replace on the fly.

It seems that for lower-ranked freshmen who are not guaranteed OAD's, there is a VERY fine window between playing well enough to leave and playing poorly enough that you transfer away or get recruited over and therefore fail to develop. Since 2015 we have had very few players fall into this window. The guys you mentioned all sting for the reason you mentioned - when building a recruiting pipeline you plan for them to be there multiple years, but then they're not. The players that do stick around tend to underperform. Yes we do have guys like DeLaurier, Bolden, Amile, etc. but I would argue that all of them underperformed relative to their recruiting rankings. Even Grayson arguably underperformed his last two years.

I am not against the OAD model, I like having these elite talents and I think that K's time with the national team has put him in this mode where he wants to coach the very best players and just give them freedom to go. I understand the frustrations with it and I agree that it would be nice to have a balance of upperclassmen, but I think there are inherent challenges in balancing your recruiting between OAD's and multi-year guys. In my mind the guys ranked 10-20'ish are kind of the worst of both worlds because they're not quite good enough to dominate right away, but they're still good enough to leave after a year.

[wsb3]

I'm going to be impolite and quote myself from another thread, but watching Cassius Stanley in the dunk contest tonight after reading all these posts today brought home the fact that he was not recruited as a one-and-done, and his presence on this team as a sophomore would have made a huge difference. His shooting, defense, athleticism, toughness, and fire in the backcourt could easily have pushed Duke into the upper echelon of the ACC, and made the team a potential final four contender. Just a bad break (for Duke at least) that preceded a season of bad breaks.

I agree and I think there is a good chance that if he remained one more year that he might have played himself into the lottery and ultimately made more $$$.

[SouthernDukie]

I agree and I think there is a good chance that if he remained one more year that he might have played himself into the lottery and ultimately made more $$$.

Not positive about ascending up to the lottery, but I do believe one more year could have gotten him into the first round and a guaranteed contract.

[jv001]

It seems that for lower-ranked freshmen who are not guaranteed OAD's, there is a VERY fine window between playing well enough to leave and playing poorly enough that you transfer away or get recruited over and therefore fail to develop. Since 2015 we have had very few players fall into this window. The guys you mentioned all sting for the reason you mentioned - when building a recruiting pipeline you plan for them to be there multiple years, but then they're not. The players that do stick around tend to underperform. Yes we do have guys like DeLaurier, Bolden, Amile, etc. but I would argue that all of them underperformed relative to their recruiting rankings. Even Grayson arguably underperformed his last two years.

I am not against the OAD model, I like having these elite talents and I think that K's time with the national team has put him in this mode where he wants to coach the very best players and just give them freedom to go. I understand the frustrations with it and I agree that it would be nice to have a balance of upperclassmen, but I think there are inherent challenges in balancing your recruiting between OAD's and multi-year guys. In my mind the guys ranked 10-20'ish are kind of the worst of both worlds because they're not quite good enough to dominate right away, but they're still good enough to leave after a year.

I agree with you but I hesitate to put Amile in with DeLaurier and Bolden. I think Amile Jefferson was a good player that got the most out of his body. Javin and Bolden on the other hand never reached their potential, especially Javin. I thought he had the natural ability to be at least a 2nd round player but for whatever reason, he never reached that level. Poor hands and no shooting touch held him back. He's the type player that you hope by his junior or senior year he's the DeAndre Hunter or Jay Huff player.

GoDuke!

[wsb3]

That's why I would like to see the NBA go to something like the MLB route in drafting college players. High school players can be drafted after high school upon graduation or if a drop out the player must be out of high school one year. ...However the NBA probably won't go this route because they have it made the way it is set up now. GoDuke!

I agree and I have said this a gazillion times as have my fellow fans but I don't think the NBA will ever have any interest in doing it. Heck, I would settle for staying 2 years.

We are in a down year obviously and I am shocked that with the OAD model that we have not suffered more years like this. I won't complain about this year. In perspective, I have an adopted little sister so to speak. She is a diehard DUKE fan. (Like to think I helped that along. Took her to Cameron in 2015) She turns 26 this year and she has never known a year that DUKE did not make the NCAAT.

[Jaks19]

Can really say much for next year. Banchero and Griffin are both alpha type players that are not only good players but tough kids. It is still unknown as to who will return but the roster looks good "on paper". Player development and additions will be interesting to see.

[SkyBrickey]

The timing of this debate is a bit ironic as we have 4 likely returning sophomores who were ranked 20-50 coming out of high school. It’s why I was so excited by this recruiting class even though I knew this year might be a little down ( not expecting this down). This is a class Tony Bennett would love to have and sets us up to compete for championships the next 3 years with the addition of 1-2 OAD talents - and hopefully more 3-4 year players - in each new class. I choose to see these rising sophs as a great foundation.

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

The timing of this debate is a bit ironic as we have 4 likely returning sophomores who were ranked 20-50 coming out of high school. It’s why I was so excited by this recruiting class even though I knew this year might be a little down ( not expecting this down). This is a class Tony Bennett would love to have and sets us up to compete for championships the next 3 years with the addition of 1-2 OAD talents - and hopefully more 3-4 year players - in each new class. I choose to see these rising sophs as a great foundation.

Then you were one of the realistic ones it seems. It's impossible to change the recruiting strategy to have kids who stay longer, and not have a dip in talent and performance - at least for a year or so.

I guess other folks wanted us to recruit Zion/RJ/Tatum, but somehow voodoo them into sticking around several years.

[DarkstarWahoo]

I guess other folks wanted us to recruit Zion/RJ/Tatum, but somehow voodoo them into sticking around several years.

I mean, Zion and Barrett would have eligibility left, and this year would have been entirely free, eligibility-wise. The virus handed K a lifeline and he flubbed it before he even knew he had it!

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

I mean, Zion and Barrett would have eligibility left, and this year would have been entirely free, eligibility-wise. The virus handed K a lifeline and he flubbed it before he even knew he had it!

Just like with Baker's redshirt!

[dm9e24]

Well, teams and schools addressed the various situations differently and prioritized things differently. I'm proud of the way Duke has conducted their business, even if it has negatively impacted the 2021 basketball season.

I'm not complaining on how Duke conducted their business. I am, or was, just concerned about Coach K. He also had to deal with a daughter who had a bad case of Covid as a stroke victim. As far as other teams and schools, I am not exactly sure what you are saying about how they prioritized things. I think there were plenty of schools who didn't take short cuts handling Covid to have winning records. Close to home, in a state that was very stringent with Covid mandates, UVa seem to have had a pretty good season with a very conservative approach to how they conducted their business. Covid protocol may have contributed greatly to the slow development of our freshman class. If things are back to normal and the players get the summer with their future teammates, we will see if it was a major factor.