Originally Posted by
CDu
As for this season:
1. I think you can consider Banchero a virtual lock to be elite. His rating is at a level for which we've never failed in the past (barring injury). We we get top-2 recruits, they are awesome. And when we have top-2 recruits in the one-and-done era, our teams have been 3 seeds or better in the NCAAs.
2. The guard play really should be significantly improved. I don't think that's even all that debatable. For one thing, the two starters this year will be a year more experienced. And based on historical growth of Duke guards recently, the freshman to sophomore jump suggests Roach should be much better. And that is ignoring that he'll have a normal offseason for the first time in his college career. So his growth may actually be moreso than the growth of a typical Duke sophomore. I see Keels as a wash with Steward, and Moore will be a year more experienced.
3. We should be a lot more versatile this year. Hurt was a one-dimensional player, and that one dimension (iso shooting) created stagnation offensively. On top of that, we were short on talent. Goldwire played hard, but he was extremely limited. Baker wasn't good enough, which forced us to play three tiny guards too much. Hurt couldn't defend, Goldwire couldn't play offense. Johnson was versatile but too often unavailable. We didn't have any backup size. This year, we have plenty of size and should have plenty of versatility. Griffin and Moore give us the size and athleticism to go big or small. Banchero can play the 4 or 5. Keels has the size to play up at the 3 if we want/need to go smaller with Roach and Blakes. Last year we basically had 3 small guards, one wing, 4 power forwards, and a center. This year, we go multiple players deep everywhere, with most of the roster able to play more than one position legitimately.
4. You mention that assuming Williams plays as well as last year as an uncertainty. Well, I'm not sure why we should expect Williams to get worse. Big men tend to get better with experience, not worse. And even if we are conservative and he plays no better than he did from when he joined the rotation (last 13 games), that's really good: 10.8 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 2 bpg in just 21.3 mpg.
5. Our level of talent in general should be better. We have a top-2 recruit, 3 more top-20 recruits, two more top-25 recruits, a top-50 recruit, and a grad student multi-year starter for a P6 school. Last year we had two #11 recruits (one of whom played just ~10 games), one more top-20 recruit, three more top-25 recruits, 2 top-40 recruits, a top-50 recruit, and a senior fringe starter. So we have one more elite player (Banchero replacing Hurt), an additional top-20 guy instead of a top-25 guy, and a more talented veteran.
6. Our talent will be a lot more experienced this year. Last year's team relied on two sophomore top-25 recruits, an underskilled senior, and five or six freshmen. This year's team will rely on a junior top-25 recruit, two sophomore top-25 recruits, a fifth-year senior (but underskilled player), and three or four freshmen. I haven't done a career-minutes count for the projected rotation players, but it should be a lot higher than it was for last year's team.
So we will be deeper, more experienced, and more talented. And we will not have the same hindrances that the 2021 team had with regards to COVID eliminating preseason prep. And we were gelling into a pretty good team by season's end as it was last year. So I feel pretty comfortable saying we should be at least a 5 seed in the NCAA tournament this year (barring injuries). And I would expect us to be higher than that. I think you are overstating the risks of those things not going right, and understating the baseline as well.