MBB: Duke 106, Stanford 70 - Postgame thread

Phredd3 said:
To my eyes, Caleb Foster has always played a lot like Jeremy Roach. He is looking to score, not pass. I think Jon was trying to turn him into more of a pure point guard, looking pass first, but it ended up causing him to overthink everything. He was an outstanding spot-up shooter toward the end of last season, but in the PG role he seemed so intent on trying to analyze that he lost his aggression and couldn't just smoothly pull the trigger when he was open.

I could be completely wrong about that, of course, and I don't want to "blame Jon" for Caleb's issues. I still think Caleb can still build on this year and ultimately be a much better player for having gone through this experiment. But I do think that Caleb is miscast as a PG. On the other hand, I think he can be really good at being a shooting guard (when he's not playing next to someone like Tyrese who is even better at it).
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His game reminds me of Jeff Capel.
 
FastBreak said:
Really good point. Who would have guessed Cooper would be shooting better than Kon at this point? Mystery is whether Kon is in a slump or this is actually his normal shooting average. From all accounts this summer, expecting him to shoot above 40% from 3 this year wasn’t unreasonable. I’m holding hope he gets better from three. No question he is at least taking good open shots, just missing them right now.
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I mean, he is shooting 37.8%. That is pretty good. I compared him early in the season to Luke Kennard as a freshman. Watching Kennard, you could tell he was going to be a GREAT 3 0oiny shooter. And he shot 32% from 3 as a freshman. Kon is going to be a GREAT 3 point shooter. And as it is, he's a very good shooter.
 
SkyBrickey said:
I think the jury is still out on Foster v Evans for 8th man duty after today. Brendan Marks made the case on the DBR pod a week or so ago that Duke really needs Foster as a productive third guard over Evans the shooter to make a title run. And I agree with him.

I'm not arguing Caleb is now the 8th man. He's not. I think Jon has a decision to make on whether to lock in Evans or to give Foster a chance to win back the role.
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I completely agree with you. However, do you think it is likely that matchups and specific game situations could dictate a rotation between the two, or is that not a sustainable situation?
 
kAzE said:
Oops . . . posted this in the wrong thread. Sorry for re-post.

I like how Tyrese has kind of taken back more of larger role in the offense lately. He's really progressed as a shot creator this year. To me, his quickness with the ball and decision making have leveled up high level over the past handful of games. He's looking aggressively to score, he knows his spots, and is strong and tough enough to get there now. He's become a truly awesome basketball player. Really proud of how far he's come.

And on the subject of guys looking to score, that 6 minute stretch from Caleb Foster is peak Caleb Foster. This guy was really miscast as a point guard for this team. His instincts when being asked to be a distributor are completely wrong, and so you get a guy who is just thinking too much every time he has the ball instead of doing the thing he's actually good at, which is getting buckets.

I'm not sure if he can sustain THAT level of production, but if we're going to get anything out of Caleb the rest of this year, you gotta let him be him. We have enough other guys who are great passers and decision makers with the ball, I think it's obvious now that Caleb isn't a PG.
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Great post
 
A very good game by the good guys. Tyrese, Cooper, Sion, and Khaman had great games. The offense was spectacular. The defensive overall numbers were not great (too many offensive rebounds and too many made 3s), but Duke controlled the paint (6-16 at the rim, 12-34 from 2). The too many made 3s was a mix of overhelping (the freshmen are especially guilty of this) and Reynaud making a fair amount of contested 3s. The offensive rebounds are a function of Duke not gang rebounding. Khaman contesting shots is going to hinder his ability for defensive rebounds. Duke needed one of Kon, Sion or Tyrese to have a good defensive rebounding game or Cooper to have a monster defensive rebounding game.

I do think how Duke defends plays a significant role in the rebounding issues. Khaman, Maliq, and Cooper are away from the rim a lot. This is a minor issue for Cooper, but a major issue for Khaman and Maliq.
 
3rd Dukie said:
I completely agree with you. However, do you think it is likely that matchups and specific game situations could dictate a rotation between the two, or is that not a sustainable situation?
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You didn't ask me but I agree with you.

More specifically, these guys have pro aspirations. They need to be able to adapt very quickly (pros can do it in game and even mid play). Evans and Foster are not going to have clearly defined rotations at this stage in the season. So they simply need to be game ready. They need to be able to insert into the game, understand the flow, understand how they can be effective team players given the situational flow, and execute.

Right now what you want from Foster is a sign that he is regrowing confidence and assessing situations well in order to sub in quickly and make a mark. Particularly in injury or foul situations to Tyrese or Sion. He showed that in mop-up time with and against the 3rd string. It's not primetime. But it's a start on his rebuilding process - and hopefully he now can sustain some traction.

Evans has been showing flashes of putting things together. He had a bad turnover or two yesterday. But he's also had some nice defensive improvement, if inconsistent, and his rebounding has looked more aware. He needs to be ready in a scenario where Kon (or dare I say, Coop) are in foul trouble or injured and we need to maintain floor spacing and offensive threats.

Neither player is going to be in the top 7 at this point. But situationally, they can fill roles that no one else on the bench can realistically fill if playing at their current near-peak. We need them there and we need them ready. As insurance - or more. The Andre Dawkins and Grayson Allen roles in the NCAAT are not flashy. But the stakes couldn't be higher.

- Chillin
 
brevity said:
I'll do a link recap later, but here is the Facebook livestream of Coach Scheyer's postgame press conference.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=534471542397022
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The quote that sums up this team and why they have such a good shot at winning some major hardware come March: "When your best player literally does not care about statistics, I think everybody else... How could you care about statistics? And Cooper does not care—he cares about winning, and I think that's contagious."
 
Such a fun game, the ball was moving and shots were going down and the defense was stifling. Extended garbage time with nearly everybody scoring and the bench hyping them up. Foster had a swagger for the first time all season, like he was out to prove he was better than anybody defending him. This is the same guy who outplayed Bronny James head to head in multiple high profile events and I hope this is the start of his confidence returning.

Blakes has had an amazing season but Proctor and James showed him why he made the right decision to leave, because he would not be getting playing time had he stayed. Proctor is becoming the player we've always hoped for him to be, he's on quite a heater and his defense has never wavered. I also totally forgot that Neil Begovich transfered from Stanford, that was an awesome moment to get him that breakaway dunk against his former team.
 
UrinalCake said:
I also totally forgot that Neil Begovich transfered from Stanford, that was an awesome moment to get him that breakaway dunk against his former team.
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I wondered if people remembered that Neal and his brother Daniel, former grad assistant at Duke, were from the Bay Area and both played undergrad at Stanford. So happy that Neal had this moment yesterday; he seems like a great teammate.
 
Neals384 said:
I watched both pressers; no one asked about Smith's halftime explosion. Just a wild guess, but maybe he was upset by the crazies' Alexandra chant?
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If that is true, he should thank his personal higher power that this wasn’t the 1970s/1980s version of Cameron. He’d be in the fetal position for weeks.
 
TKG said:
If that is true, he should thank his personal higher power that this wasn’t the 1970s/1980s version of Cameron. He’d be in the fetal position for weeks.
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Like the time the William and Mary player did not make the trip to Cameron after some plagiarism issues? Previously, the Duke students waved “ blue books” during a player introduction for an opposing player who had been caught cheating on an exam.
 
FastBreak said:
Mystery is whether Kon is in a slump or this is actually his normal shooting average. From all accounts this summer, expecting him to shoot above 40% from 3 this year wasn’t unreasonable. I’m holding hope he gets better from three.
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I’m not worried about it. If three of his misses this season had gone in instead, he’d be at about 40%. That’s just one make instead of a miss every eight games or so.
 
JayZee said:
I want Kon to be a sniper in March. March and April 2025, to be precise.

Wish him luck next year (assuming he goes pro) but definitely more interested in this year…
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38% is very good at his volume. It can be frustrating because he looks like he should be making 60%.

We are seeing Tyrese and Cooper really dial in their shooting. We may see the same from Kon before it's done.

Over the past 7 games from three: Isaiah 27%, Kon 38%, Cooper 47%, Tyrese 51%.
 
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g111m1c said:
I’m not worried about it. If three of his misses this season had gone in instead, he’d be at about 40%. That’s just one make instead of a miss every eight games or so.
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After 24 games last season, McCain was at about 38% (50/130) on 3-pointers. His next game was the big one against FSU in which he went 8/11 from three-point range. He went on to finish the season at over 41%.

After 24 games this season, Kon was at about 38% (54/143) on 3-pointers. (He went 1/3 against Stanford and remains at about 38%).

The college game may start slowing down for Kon (if it hasn’t already) and he’s becoming more comfortable with how quickly he needs to get his shot off versus in high school.

Very much in the cards that Kon can will finish the season shooting over 40% on three-pointers.
 
g111m1c said:
After 24 games last season, McCain was at about 38% (50/130) on 3-pointers. His next game was the big one against FSU in which he went 8/11 from three-point range. He went on to finish the season at over 41%.

After 24 games this season, Kon was at about 38% (54/143) on 3-pointers. (He went 1/3 against Stanford and remains at about 38%).

The college game may start slowing down for Kon (if it hasn’t already) and he’s becoming more comfortable with how quickly he needs to get his shot off versus in high school.

Very much in the cards that Kon can will finish the season shooting over 40% on three-pointers.
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I like the way you think!
 
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