MBB: Duke 71, Clemson 69 Post-Game Thread

[Saratoga2]

1. Roach had an excellent game with 9 assists and just 1 turnover. He contributed much needed points down the stretch and his defense was very good

2. Williams also was a big factor in the win with a double double and acted as a very good rim protector again.

3. Banchero is an important scorer but his decision making when trying to put the ball on the floor against double teams and some ill advised shots leaves some thinking his decision making is questionable. He may also have been fatiguing.

4. We really miss Keels as he pressures the ball and limits passes to open men. His ball handling and ball security is also good and complements Roaches talents. He can take some of the ball handling responsibilities off of Moore and Banchero.

5. Moore is not the best option to bring the ball up as he still is turnover prone and his decision making and shot selection is a concern. On the other hand he is a fine defensive player and contributes a lot offensively when coming off the ball.

[DukieInBrasil]

This team has major flaws that up to this point show no trends of getting fixed. Can't rebound or hold on to the ball. They're now mainstays in every game.

My bad. I was thinking of the previous game.

In the previous game he scored 8 on 3-5 FGs, vs FSU.
Gotta go back 3 games, vs NCSU, to last he shot poorly.

[Stray Gator]

The stats actually don't, without 11 first half turnovers the team is up by double digits. Any half with double digit turnovers is a problem and lately we've had multiple. Our lead in the second half was purely a result of not turning the ball over and timely shooting.

According to the play-by-play record on ESPN, Duke had 9 turnovers in the first half, and Clemson had 6 turnovers in the first half. Even assuming your count of 11 is correct, Duke still only had 5 more turnovers than Clemson in the first half. So given that the score was tied at halftime, to posit that Duke would have been up by double digits without those extra 5 turnovers necessarily assumes that Duke would have scored on all 5 of those extra possessions. That's a tenuous assumption even in a game where Duke is firing on all cylinders offensively; in a game where Duke is playing like this, it's sheer fantasy.

Yes, turnovers are terribly frustrating, especially those that result from carelessness. And this team has shown a nagging tendency to be lackadaisical and not value the ball, both in committing turnovers and in getting outhustled or outfought for rebounds and loose balls. But I believe you're overstating the damage that turnovers caused in this game. From my perspective, the sluggishness on both ends was a more serious problem, because until the last few minutes, it appeared to me that Duke's players simply failed to consistently match the effort and intensity of Clemson's players. Turnovers constitute one manifestation of those lapses, but not the only ones or even the most costly ones.

[KandG]

I had a problem with it. It was contested, too early in the shot clock (had 10 more seconds), he had been owning the paint and it lead to that breakaway dunk that cut a 4 point lead to 2 with less than 50 seconds to play. You eat as much clock as you can in those situations.

This was really not great from Paolo, should have run it down as close to 30 seconds as possible. Even if we miss and they score, then we’re not forced to do anything and can run the clock down, and they have to foul. Plus they had fouls to give which would have run the clock down more.

It ended up not hurting us because we got a well run play for a basket after they got the quick two — one could even make a case it was better that we had to attack rather than rely on our FT shooting to close the game out — but totally agree the original three was very poor clock management.

[goduke03861]

According to the play-by-play record on ESPN, Duke had 9 turnovers in the first half, and Clemson had 6 turnovers in the first half. Even assuming your count of 11 is correct, Duke still only had 5 more turnovers than Clemson in the first half. So given that the score was tied at halftime, to posit that Duke would have been up by double digits without those extra 5 turnovers necessarily assumes that Duke would have scored on all 5 of those extra possessions. That's a tenuous assumption even in a game where Duke is firing on all cylinders offensively; in a game where Duke is playing like this, it's sheer fantasy.

Yes, turnovers are terribly frustrating, especially those that result from carelessness. And this team has shown a nagging tendency to be lackadaisical and not value the ball, both in committing turnovers and in getting outhustled or outfought for rebounds and loose balls. But I believe you're overstating the damage that turnovers caused in this game. From my perspective, the sluggishness on both ends was a more serious problem, because until the last few minutes, it appeared to me that Duke's players simply failed to consistently match the effort and intensity of Clemson's players. Turnovers constitute one manifestation of those lapses, but not the only ones or even the most costly ones.

The assumption was based on the fact Clemson got 12 points off said turnovers. So if we cut those turnovers in half and scored on just one or two of said possessions it's double digits. We can argue this point til the cows come home but I, and would be willing Coach K thinks we have a turnover issue with this team since ACC play began.

[CDu]

The assumption was based on the fact Clemson got 12 points off said turnovers. So if we cut those turnovers in half and scored on just one or two of said possessions it's double digits. We can argue this point til the cows come home but I, and would be willing Coach K thinks we have a turnover issue with this team since ACC play began.

Clemson got only like 5 points in transition off Duke’s 9 1st half turnovers. Any other points were in a half court defense, and thus no different than a missed shot.

And I would agree that Duke has had a turnover problem in ACC play. But they didn’t so much have a turnover problem overall tonight.

The main things we did poorly tonight were defend the 3 and get defensive rebounds.

[FerryFor50]

When they post the slow down rewatch on the front page I think you'll find your opinion shift a bit. It's very hard to transition defend on top of the key turnovers.

Here's the ACCN highlight video. It doesn't cover all the points off turnovers. In fact, it just shows one in the first half.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMwWXKns31g

At :39 of the video (11:58 game clock), Mark makes a bad handoff pass to Roach on a cut. Clemson gets it and Clemson pushes it. Just 3 Duke defenders are back. One of them is Mark Williams. Roach and Moore didn't get back. Clemson pulls it out and hits an open three.

As for the entire first half turnovers:

https://sports.yahoo.com/ncaab/duke-...?section=plays

- 17:41, AJ turns it over. Clemson scores 11 seconds later on a layup. (2 points directly off turnovers)

- 16:33, Banchero turnover (charge). Missed Clemson three.

- 15:31 - Williams turnover results in Banchero's 2nd foul

- 12:52 - Wendell Moore turnover results in Joey Baker foul

- 11:58 - Williams turnover results in open three due to poor transition D (5 points directly off turnovers)

- 10:45 - Wendell Moore turnover. Next play is Clemson turnover

- 9:02 - AJ Griffin turnover results in missed Clemson three

- 6:36 - Roach turnover results in Clemson three 8 seconds later (8 points directly off turnovers)

- 1:25 - Wendell Moore turnover on a charge; Clemson misses the next shot

I don't know which of those were "top of the key" turnovers, but even if they all were, it didn't account for very many points. They were just wasted possessions.

Clemson scored 36 in the first half. Turnovers accounted for around 22% of those points. Again, I don't see that as an issue.

[KandG]

I’m just saying, I’d rather not see Joey in there anymore for the last 5 minutes of a tight game. He’ll likely be exploited.

Not sure Griffin is any better at this point, he makes more mistakes turning his head on back cuts, dies on screens, closes out on shooters with inconsistent effort, and despite being a better athlete than Joey isn’t exactly a wizard at moving his feet defensively.

I hope AJ improves defensively as he continues to develop, but it looks to me like the coaching staff trusts Joey’s maturity and defensive awareness more than Griffin’s at this point. Though depending on how well either player is doing on offense and how the matchups play out, it may be a tossup (Griffin got the late minutes vs FSU, and was exploited plenty then)

[kcduke75]

Stop watching shots. Crash the offensive glass or get back on D. Stop watching shots.

I'm voting for you, Senator. This.

It seems like they hang around the 3 point line in the corners waiting for a kick-out off the offensive rebound. Since we seem to be getting about 3-5 a game, that may not be a money play. I sure would prefer that these wings crash from the corners and then get some offensive rebounds and kick out to the top of the key.

And before I fall off my soapbox, it appears that it's too bad we are so talented and athletic that we've never learned to block out. It kills me to see them flatfooted and watching the ball. Seems correctable, but so far, no change. Our opposition seems to be capable . . . .

All that said, great win (we're definitely getting team's best shot) and we had to be tired, lots of minutes played, let's keep it rolling . . .

[FerryFor50]

This was really not great from Paolo, should have run it down as close to 30 seconds as possible. Even if we miss and they score, then we’re not forced to do anything and can run the clock down, and they have to foul. Plus they had fouls to give which would have run the clock down more.

It ended up not hurting us because we got a well run play for a basket after they got the quick two — one could even make a case it was better that we had to attack rather than rely on our FT shooting to close the game out — but totally agree the original three was very poor clock management.

Duke also had fouls to give and could have caused Clemson to burn even MORE clock and inbound it several more times. Just bad clock management down the stretch there.

[CDu]

Gotta give the coaches some cred for the play calls on the last two possessions out of timeouts.

First, running some motion and a fake high ball screen to create an iso for Banchero in the post against the smaller Tyson (and a perfectly timed entry pass by Roach).

Then, with Clemson needing a steal with 1.7 seconds, running some horizontal misdirection to get Moore free to kill the clock.

Critical coaching in big moments there.

[Dr. Maturin]

Gotta give the coaches some cred for the play calls on the last two possessions out of timeouts.

First, running some motion and a fake high ball screen to create an iso for Banchero in the post against the smaller Tyson (and a perfectly timed entry pass by Roach).

Then, with Clemson needing a steal with 1.7 seconds, running some horizontal misdirection to get Moore free to kill the clock.

Critical coaching in big moments there.

Yep, that was good stuff, and good execution as well. A young team needs to get reps in these situations, and hopefully we grew up some tonight.

[uh_no]

Gotta give the coaches some cred for the play calls on the last two possessions out of timeouts.

First, running some motion and a fake high ball screen to create an iso for Banchero in the post against the smaller Tyson (and a perfectly timed entry pass by Roach).

Then, with Clemson needing a steal with 1.7 seconds, running some horizontal misdirection to get Moore free to kill the clock.

Critical coaching in big moments there.

I'm not sure we needed something that fancy on the last possession. Just chuck it down the court for someone to tip it up in the air. I'm not complaining, of course, but I thought the play was riskier than it needed to be.

[kcduke75]

The breakaway dunk was Baker's man, but Paolo shouldn't have tried to crash the boards for an offensive board. Gotta be aware of the situation.

Disagree, he knew the shot was off and went for an offensive rebound (good for him!) Baker let his man go and cost us a dunk. Guards are supposed to rotate back.

[weezie]

Did K say anything in post game presser about Moore's ankle?

[simplyluvin]

A win is a win, and we gutted this one out. There are still some concerns. We had double-digit turnovers in the first half in the last two games. We've got to clean that up. We also got torched on the glass. Our team rebounding needs to improve. Our perimeter D was subpar tonight.

That being said, we didn't play all that bad. Clemson shot lights out, but then so did we. One bright spot is that Roach is really developing into a nice playmaker and may have earned his starting spot back. When Keels comes back, does AJ go back to the bench?

[SilkyJ]

Gotta give the coaches some cred for the play calls on the last two possessions out of timeouts.

First, running some motion and a fake high ball screen to create an iso for Banchero in the post against the smaller Tyson (and a perfectly timed entry pass by Roach).

Then, with Clemson needing a steal with 1.7 seconds, running some horizontal misdirection to get Moore free to kill the clock.

Critical coaching in big moments there.

I’ll bite. What about not calling timeout with 10.6 seconds left (after Banchero’s layup) to set our defense? Despite coming off a made basket, our defense was completely out of sorts with way too many people pressuring in the front court leading to an open 3 with 8 seconds left.

Coach K said against FSU (and countless times before) that he doesn’t like to call timeout with the ball in late game situations b/c it allows the defense to get set. He believes Set Defense > Set Offense. So why not call timeout there?? If Clemson makes that shot its a 1 point game with 6+ Seconds on the clock.

Now, my personal view: I wouldn’t call a timeout there b/c it allows Clemson to run a set play (and similarly I would have wanted coach K to call a TO against FSU so that we could run a play).

But Coach can’t have it both ways, and there’s certainly no excuse for how poorly we played defense on that possession. The team should have been back in a 3/4 or 1/2 court press to slow the ball, but having 2 guys above the foul line led to a really bad defensive possession that could have been more costly.

(BTW i thought we generally played well tonight. We certainly shot the lights out…don’t understand why such a large team is losing rebounding wars…tonight it felt like Clemson brought more energy, but we matched it just enough)

[jimmymax]

Box score says 18 assists on 25 baskets. That seems uber generous. As relieved as I am that Duke won I'm (unfortunately) going to have to watch the recording. I guess an aimless possession with 20+ seconds of dribbling behind the arc followed by an unproductive feed into a clogged lane that ends in a desperation kick for a last second shot is the equivalent of baseball's seeing-eye groundball RBI.

[dukelion]

My guess is Roach remains in the starting 5 when Keels comes back...kid is just playing too good...insane assist to TO ratio over the 4 games...almost 9:1.

[tbyers11]

Disagree, he knew the shot was off and went for an offensive rebound (good for him!) Baker let his man go and cost us a dunk. Guards are supposed to rotate back.

Nope. Banchero hesitantly went for the offensive rebound (which he had no chance of getting) and it was his man (Tyson) that took off and got the dunk. Roach was on the right side of the the top of key and should have rotated back but he was also ball watching. Baker was in the corner and was the only one paying attention. He tried to get back but had no chance from where started.