5 thoughts...
1. I was actually fine with Wake coming back in the 2nd. I wanted to see how Duke would respond. Would they panic or fold or ? Nope. In a hostile environment in an ugly, low scoring, physical game, with an opponent that NEEDED the win for their tournament resume, they righted the ship, took the lead and solidly held on in the last minutes for the road win. Realistically, Duke is very likely going to lose a game in the ACCs. It could have been this one, but it wasn't. Thumbs up!
2. Gills' most critical game in a Duke uni by far. I liked how much he seemed to be talking on the court, keeping the team focused. Save for another wild pass for a turnover earlier in the game, he was very solid. And I think his late 3 really shifted the complexion of the final minute from a back and forth game to a Wake-must-catch-up game.
3. Except for his 7 TOs, Flagg was brilliant again. He's such a weapon. But Crispin seemed to be making an excuse for him, saying he only had so many TOs because he handled the ball so much. If your PG had 7 TOs, he wouldn't be your PG for long. Even if this was somehow in the staff's plan to keep putting the ball in his hands so much, Flagg needs to limit those TOs...
4. Ngongba's minutes were big. Not exactly why he played quite so much more than Maluach, who I thought was being reasonably effective on D. But Ngongba filled in admirably defending Reid. He's not playing well enough (yet?) to threaten Brown's minutes when he returns. But this performance has to give him confidence, and perhaps give the staff more confidence playing him when needed.
5. Happy to beat Wake at Joel. I'm sure Proctor was tired of losing to them there, court storming or not. I sure was.
9F