Duke training staff will be working hard tonight and tomorrow morning. That was rugby with the wrong shaped ball.
Scott Rich on the front page
Trinity BS 2012; University of Michigan PhD 2018
Duke Chronicle, Sports Online Editor: 2010-2012
K-Ville Blue Tenting 2009-2012
Unofficial Brian Zoubek Biographer
If you have questions about Michigan Basketball/Football, I'm your man!
Duke training staff will be working hard tonight and tomorrow morning. That was rugby with the wrong shaped ball.
Excellent win.
Thought two of the biggest stretches for us were: 1) the end of the first half, where we finally gained some separation, and 2) the stretch in the second half where Flip and Lively both had four fouls, we entered the double bonus early and put them on the FT line a lot, and we had to survive Key and Sueing attacking the basket relentlessly. Surviving that stretch with a two possession lead was crucial, and Flip coming back in to give our offense a boost helped close things out.
Apart from the game being played at home, good simulation of a tournament game, having to deal with very inconsistent policing of the physicality leading to some questionable calls (not least the “technical” on Roach) and potentially fatal foul trouble on key players. The fact that we were able to play through the adversity is a very positive step forward in the development of this group.
Proctor had a weird shooting line (two big threes, comfortably made his FTs, but missed all five of his two pointers) but I’m enjoying seeing him continue to blossom. Though Roach had the ball for most of the closing minutes, Scheyer seems very comfortable trusting Tyrese with significant spells of directing the offense.
Interesting that Blakes really didn’t get many (any?) minutes in the second half after a good first half, we mostly ran with Grandison as part of a three guard lineup and played Young and either Mitchell or Flip down the stretch.
Ryan Young — not bad considering how much we overpraise him on this board (sorry, inside joke). In all seriousness, he continues to look like a great pickup for us and makes big plays whatever his limitations.
Liked that the offense featured more movement of our bigs and made it easier for our guards to find people open in the post and on back cuts. Nine assists in the first half is more than we’ve had in the entirety of every game against previous quality opponents, and 16 assists overall is fantastic. I really liked Lively’s performance today: his activity was fantastic despite the foul trouble and occasionally getting worked by OSU’s frontline.
Another highlight: 18 for 20 on free throws in the second half in an ultra physical game (weirdly, the only misses coming from Roach).
Good offensive showing despite only taking three (!) three pointers in the second half.and 13 overall. Whitehead had some highlights but is still very feast or famine with his decisions and general feel for the game. Good news is he can only get better, and so can our team.
I also liked Grandison’s defense down the stretch- he made some big plays
So many contributors to this team. I love it. That rebound by Young towards the end, when he was being undercut, was unbelievable. And big props to Grandison too. it's those little things that win games.
Excellent bounce back win against a quality opponent. As others have said, we had contributions from many players in this one. Filipowski was in foul trouble and with him out, the team is definitely less effective. Still, he was in for 30 minutes so that is probably all we should expect from a big man anyway. He needs to avoid careless fouls.
I thought Proctor was very important to the win, not only hitting some important baskets, he was perfect from the foul line, acted as a play maker and was secure with the ball. Young was also very effective and he played with tenacity and spirit. With Filipowski an Lively out we needed to rely on him an his inside play.
Lively is a factor in our defense as only a mobile 7'1" guy can be. He hustled and was able to score off some nice passes. Roach has the quickness and handle to pick his spots scoring an contributed tonight.
While Grandison added 9 points and clearly Jon thinks he is ahead of Whitehead at this point, I did think he lacked the strength to keep players from posting him up and he made at least two bad turnovers that I wouldn't expect such an experienced player to make.
Let's hope players can build in this success going forward.
There was a stretch in the 2nd half, from around the 11 minute mark to the 6 minute mark, where OSU scored on 8 of 9 possessions. Despite that inability to get stops, our offense held serve and never let the lead drop below 5, which was huge. That stretch was capped by a sequence where they got 2 clean looks from 3 and couldn’t convert.
Really solid win. Glad to see Lively have a good scoring game. Let’s keep it rolling.
Shout out to Coach Scheyer for having the team prepped.
Proctor is my favorite player on this team. Defense is underrated. His passing and scoring is getting better and better. Flashes of brilliance tonight.
Lively starting to flex his game. Some great moments. But also a really strong game by Young against a very good team. We have two great centers. What a luxury.
Grandison with a solid game other than a few early turnovers.
Feeling really good about our upside after this win.
Nebraska and ND win. ACC 8-6.
I think there's something to be said for shooting fewer three pointers. Notably we also shot a high percentage against Xavier (5-11) and perusing our box scores we also went 6-14 against Delaware. A big exception was Bellarmine where we shot 14-35 (the only game in which we hit 40%+ at a high volume). Point being, we don't have the kind of lights out shooters who can jack up threes no matter what, we have to restrict ourselves to taking only good, open threes when they are there.
Flip was +16 tonight in 30 mins
Yup I mentioned the other day, I think that will be the key stat. Less than 15 3-point attempts, you'll see mostly wins from Duke. More than 15 and approaching 20, it's going to be ugly.
Credit this win to Scheyer. I liked that Roach was playing off the ball in the first half. He kind of got lost, but he'll get used to it. Loved the constant attempts at pick and rolls for Lively to get going. By far his best game. He was disruptive on D at times and much more aggressive going for rebounds.
Whitehead has a pretty 3-point shot. High arching. Almost too high. I didn't like that he curled out for the 3 on the fast break but was glad he made it.
Mitchell is clearly the guy to get less minutes as time goes in. Nothing against him, but his ability to be strong and get to the rim appeared to only exist against inferior opponents.
We did a better job at making good decisions when penetrating into the lane. I saw less forced difficult layups, although, roach has 1 or 2. Roach had one step through that showed patience that I liked. Proctor had that great assist at the end of the shot clock.
Roach isn't an elite free throw shooter. He's our captain but I don't trust him to sink crucial free throws at the end of close games. Proctor and Flip are potentially elite. With Flip's killer mentality, he's the one I want taking those types of free throws. Also, forget the Laettner comparisons. He reminded me of Kevin Durant tonight.
The best part of the night - the recruit cheering with the crazies. I forget his name. He really seemed to get into it. It was fun seeing him do all the cheers. He was so easy to pick out in the crowd since he was a foot taller than everyone else and the only person wearing black clothes. I hope he comes to do. He looks like he has quite a likeable personality.
Only thing better than a duke win? A UNC loss. They might get a break in the rankings since they lost an away game to #10, but there's a chance that come Monday, UNC will have gone from the #1 team in the country to unranked ina matter of about a week and a half.
And yes, the Villanova shot against UNC was better than any Duke championship.
The stats look better than I thought the game did.
OFFENSE
Possessions: 68.4 (not as slow as our past four games)
oRtg: 1.18 (1.24 "adjusted," for what the adjustment is worth this time of year; excellent; equivalent of #1 offense in the land, again for what such ratings are worth in November)
eFG%: 50.0% (decent)
3pt%: 38.5% (good)
2pt%: 47.6% (inadequate)
%threes: 23.6% (a little low)
FT rate: 54.5% (very muscular; our best free throw rate of the young season)
OR%: 40.6% (great, after two clunkers in a row; though believe it or not, this actually brings our season average down)
TO%: 19.0% (barely adequate)
a/to: 1.23:1
%assisted: 64.0% (good)
fast break pts: 14 (17.3% of points; good)
DEFENSE
dRtg: 1.05 (0.91 "adjusted," for what the adjustment is worth this time of year; decent; equivalent of #20 defense in the country, again for what such ratings are worth in November)
eFG%: 50.0% (meh)
3pt%: 23.1% (good)
2pt%: 54.8% (yuck)
%threes: 23.1% (good)
FT rate: 40.0% (terrible, our fifth poor FTR in six games)
DR%: 63.6% (poor)
TO%: 23.4% (outstanding)
a/to: 0.38:1 (nice and low)
%assisted: 23.1% (also nice and low)
stl%: 13.2% (excellent)
blk%: 4.8% (2pt shots) (not good)
fast break pts: 16 (22.2% of points; very bad)
Our offense was very strong, especially our free throw rate, but we also shot our threes well and dominated the offensive boards. Our defense was a little iffy, especially our opposing free throw rate, defensive rebounding, and opponent's two-point%, though on the plus side we did force a lot of turnovers. Also, we shouldn't give up this many fast break points to a team with the #226 tempo.