Duke 72, Kentucky 77 Post Game Thread

DCDevil9194 said:
How would feel if Flagg took and made the shot with 20 seconds, and we held on to win by 2? A couple of missed plays does not change the trajectory of this team. They will learn for the poor execution and hopefully make more threes.
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Results based thinking is always bad, win or lose.

If Flagg had scored and we won by 2 there would be many of us trying to make the same points about our weaknesses only the pushback would be even stronger and sprinkled with a little "some of you will never be happy" for good measure.
 
A lot of folk complaining that Scheyer didn't have the guys ready for physical play. I disagree. Had Sion not gotten hurt I am 100% sure we win that game. He and Brown are ready to play physical and help their teammates overcome that type of cheap physicality that UK employed. So that part isn't on Jon. Now, better in-game coaching late is on him. In that sense I'd have to say Pope outcoached him.

Bottom line:

1) Hope & pray that Sion isn't out for long - he is absolutely vital to this team.

2) Hope & pray that Khaman doesn't have any knee or calf issues and his struggles last night were only about cramping.

3) Hope & pray that we don't have another shooting night from 3 like last night (but we probably will).

4) Hope & pray that Jon's in-game coaching matures. He is, after all, our still young head coach.

5) Hope & pray that Cooper learns from his attempted late game heroics. This isn't high school ball anymore. Taking over isn't going to be as easy now.

6) Hope & pray that our starting guards get better. We have a junior & sophomore. Let's hope we see continued progress from both of them.

7) Hope & pray we don't see too many teams shoot 40% from 3 while we only shoot 17% from 3. We'll lose a lot of those games.

8) Hope & pray we don't have to play with only 6 1/2 players in a crucial second half of a game any more. I still think our guys were gassed at the end, and not having a solid 8 man rotation for the second half is the reason.
 
What a hard fought game. At the end, Kentucky outplayed us and made the plays down the stretch to win. Our guys showed a lot of heart and Cooper Flagg proved he is indeed the real deal! The only drawbacks I can see is that maybe Scheyer could have drawn up a little different play at the end to set up Flagg a little better. But our guys will learn from this! It’s only November folks! We shoot the three a little better, and we’re talking about a whole different ball game! Next play!!
 
I will concur with the upside that we lost a nailbiter against a well-coached, veteran, top-20 opponent despite having what hopefully will be our worst shooting night of the season. So that's promising. But we still need to play better in the second half. And we really need to avoid shooting that poorly again if at all possible (Captain Obvious alert).
 
brevity said:
According to ESPN's Jeff Borzello, Coach Scheyer did not offer any injury updates, but said that Sion James will be evaluated in Durham.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1856668678483255767
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I'll say it one last time, since I don't see too many others being as concerned as I am: Sion James is CRITICAL to this team's championship aspirations. He's a guy we went out and got specifically for these type of situations (aggressive, physical teams trying to punk us). I don't even want to think about it if he's out for any length of time.
 
In a weird way this reminded me of the Elite 8 game against State last year. A decent first half with a lead despite poor shooting. Then the second half was about as rotten as it could get. I truly don't think we'll see them be this bad again this year. The whole atmosphere was just strange last night and the officiating was unusual as well.
 
Alan_Wilson said:
I’m not going to lose sleep over a hard fought loss to a good team, but where were our guards down the stretch? Proctor and foster might as well not have played in the second half. Part of that is on Jon: everyone in the chat melting over cooper. Maybe someone besides the 17 year old with the team on his shoulders should have the ball in their hands and make a play?
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Yes, I thought Jon let too much rest on Cooper's shoulders down the stretch. We have other talented players.
 
SouthernDukie said:
I'll say it one last time, since I don't see too many others being as concerned as I am: Sion James is CRITICAL to this team's championship aspirations. He's a guy we went out and got specifically for these type of situations (aggressive, physical teams trying to punk us). I don't even want to think about it if he's out for any length of time.
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Agree that kids a solid good player.while flagg is great .im really liking james ability to change our intensity.
 
CDu said:
Some of my thoughts on the game (in no particular order):

1. Kentucky took Knueppel out of the game. Aside from a brief stretch late in the first half where he got some transition baskets and UK put Brea on him, Knueppel just couldn't get any traction. And he was basically MIA in the second half: 1-8 FGA, 2 pts. For a team who built their offense around two guys, it is a real problem when the primary scorer gets shut down.
2. Flagg had a great game overall, but down the stretch he was just trying to do too much. That's not really his game.
3. The concerns about the team's backcourt remains relevant, as Foster was a no-show and Proctor played mostly off-ball.
4. Glad that Maluach appears to be okay. He was very effective when UK had a traditional big on the floor, ineffective when Carr moved to C.
5. I thought for sure we were going to win when we had the ball with about 35 seconds left in a tie game. But terrible execution on that play out of time out, and maybe not the best play design to begin with.
6. Pope made a switch late to have Oweh guard Flagg, and I think it affected Flagg. Oweh was able to get low on him and make Flagg uncomfortable off the dribble.

Young team, in their first taste of adversity. It didn't go well. Hopefully they can regroup quickly, as they have 3 more tough tests in the coming weeks.
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Great points CDu. I believe most DBR folks believed that this Duke teams' offense was going to be based on 3-point shooting. That seemed to be the case in the cupcake games. However, I mentioned in another thread what happens when the 3s are not falling in games against good opponents? I thought that question was answered in the first half last night when we made the 2-point shots. However, in the 2nd half the refs swallowed their whistles and the game got very physical. So much so Duke lost their most physical guard and their true 5 got cramps. I don''t know if the physicality played a part in that. Probably not. I pray Sion is not out for a long time because in my mind, next to Kon, he's the most important perimeter player that plays meaningful minutes.

GoDuke!
 
Losing to KY.deep breath.i will stay positive we have so much upside going forward. I have a good feeling about this team.that isn't always the case.
 
The two injuries really rattled the team and one could clearly see it. That's exactly when they closed the difference in points. It also seemed like Khaman hurt his knee and Sion's injury seemed serious. Glad that it was just cramps. Any word on Sion?
 
bluedevilwildcats said:
Another poster suggested adding an offensive coordinator and I agree. Against really good teams that take away Plan A, we need schemes to diversify our approach. Xs and Os aren't Jon's strength as a coach.
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Do you think Jon Scheyer is not smart enough to learn those things? Plus, the bench is already full of assistant coaches. Some have played professionally. If Jon doesn't learn those things, I'd say it would be stubbornness. Going to our best player at the end of games is not a bad idea. Bad execution is what dooms those plays. Anyway, Duke should have been comfortably in the lead if they had shot FTs and just a decent percent of their 3s.

GoDuke!
 
If we make even a decent amount of our 3's we win. Maybe the larger gym causes sight line issues when you're used to shooting in Cameron all summer and preseason? Perhaps an exhibition game in Greensboro to start the season would be useful.

I think Jon struggled with end of half and end of game situations.

In the end of the first half we had the ball with 5 seconds left and inbounding around half court. He could have subbed in Evans or Harris to provide another shooter, but stayed with the lineup and let Caleb go 1 on 5 which resulted in a blocked layup. They should have several plays for that specific scenario and last night would have been the perfect chance to test the play.

At the end of the game, the ISO ball was frustrating. Danny Hurley has become the best set runner in college basketball the last several years. UConn always has a set with multiple options for end of game situations. We go ISO.

Not having a "big" guarding the Kentucky inbound at the end was crazy. We're playing Kentucky for goodness sakes. If you learned anything from a game against Kentucky....ALWAYS pressure the inbounder. Just ask Rick Pitino!

When the last time out was called, someone needed to remind the team that they had a foul to give. If Kentucky touches the ball again, either tied or behind, foul early. Coop or Kon needed to foul once Cooper turned the ball over.
 
Honestly, I don't even think the second half was overly physical. There were the two plays of note, but I don't think either was overly physical. One was a fluke where the defender fell down and into Maluach's leg, and then there was the screen that caught James' shoulder bent at an odd angle. I don't think either play was overly physical, just bad luck with normal contact just catching our guy on a joint.

Both teams were playing hard, but not overly physically. It wasn't a finesse game or anything, but it was nothing like the slugfests against Tennessee or Houston of recent past.

I thought the overall level of aggression was pretty similar between both teams. We just couldn't make shots, and may have suffered from tired legs down the stretch (with 3 of our guys playing all 20 minutes of the second half).
 
I don't mind going to Cooper at the end, that makes sense. I just want him to get the ball in better scoring position. After that, he needs to develop some "go to" moves that are his best weapons. He looked to just be trying to create on the fly off the bounce, not really sure of what he was going to do until the last second. That might work in high school. In higher level college games, I think you need more decisive moves. But it starts with getting the ball in the right positions. I don't think penetrating one on one off the dribble is the best option.
 
azzefkram said:
Combined 20 odd minutes versus Maine and Army. It wasn't a tough conclusion to reach.

As for tonight, some of the players struggled but did not look overmatched.
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They didn't look so overmatched they couldn't have given Kon four minutes of rest so maybe he was more fresh down the stretch. Harris might have *gasp* made a shot even.
 
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