MBB: Duke 70, Seattle 48 Post-game Thread

hallcity said:
I’m back from the game. There was an incident in the second half on the West side of Cameron. I was on the East side so I could see little but I heard that EMS was doing chest compressions but what I heard may have been wrong. I hope the person made it. Anyone know more?
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It happened two rows in front of me. An elderly gentleman lost consciousness and his wife and others tried to revive him, ultimately progressing to chest compressions. EMS arrived and continued to work on him. Apparently, Cameron Indoor Stadium also had a cardiologist on duty and he showed up. As they were preparing to stretcher him out, he came to. After evaluating him further, they were able to get him on his feet and, with support, get him out that way. It ended much better than it started so, hopefully, the prognosis is good.
 
tommy said:
Seems like youre assuming a team’s development, growth, and improvement, as individual players and as a cohesive team, stop and can be accurately assessed in November. I’d say this is likely to be a very different team in March than it is today, and it is then we can make judgments about how good a team it actually is.
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This exactly. I would much prefer to be our team, with the defense that we have and the offensive potential we have seen in bursts that a UNC team that simply doesn't have the ideal personnel for their "rebound and fast break" identity that they have leaned into for decades.

The bugaboo for Duke in the OAD timeline has been team defense. We have a very good defense that has proven extremely effective. Our shooters and offensive sets will improve over the next three months.

Unless you were looking for an undefeated season, I can't imagine why anyone would be selling Duke stock right now. This team will win a lot of games.
 
So my thoughts:

1. Defense was once again excellent. That seems to be the calling card for this group. Brown is just exceptional on that end of the floor. But the entire team is contributing.

2. The offense is struggling. We are just really unable to get easy looks. Every drive to the basket feels heavily contested, which suggests that we aren’t fooling anyone. The only open looks we are getting are 3s when a drive is thwarted, which is why we have taken so many threes. That is a tough way to make a living offensively. Teams are contesting on the dribble handoffs, which is making it difficult for our guys to get downhill. And we don’t have the explosiveness to break teams down off the dribble (we are long and rangy, not so much quick-twitch explosive).

3. We also aren’t getting enough from Foster. He scored the opening bucket of each half but otherwise was pretty silent. That is putting a lot of pressure on Knueppel and Flagg.

4. The heavy reliance on the 3pt shot can mask bad offense (when we make them) or mask good offense (when we miss). Right now, I think though it is accurate. We don’t have a great offense. It isn’t terrible, thanks to having a ton of talent. But we are playing at the level of a fringe top-50 offense when you take the preseason priors out of the efficiency modeling calculations. We could really benefit from finding a way to get some easy baskets, because right now the offense is a real grind.

5. Thankfully, the defense is making things a real grind for our opponents. We are #1 in the country on that end. Hopefully that continues and the offense starts to figure things out.
 
Phredd3 said:
There's been a lot of this in this and other threads, but I gotta say, I'm just not seeing it. Yeah, he scored 9 points last night, tied for third on the team, and Mason Gillis scored bupkus. But Evans literally didn't do anything else. He played for 17 minutes, and he had no rebounds, no assists, no blocks, no steals, and no defense (his DBPM was -4.5 for the game, and he's -0.9 for his short college career). I'm not seeing greatness there quite yet.

Now last night, Gillis didn't score and didn't do too much else, either, but he did grab 5 important rebounds and was third on the team with that. While Gillis provided positive defense, he was a negative on offense on a night where offense was our problem. But Gillis has a long track record of providing both solid defense and competent, if one-dimensional, offense. Offensively, Gillis is shooting nearly 150 points off his career average from 3pt range on a small sample size this season (23 attempts), but his career 3pt percentage is still almost .400. If he had just 3 more makes, he'd be within 10 points of his career average. If think his poor shooting so far this season has been mostly a question of sample size. His usage rate is spot-on with what it was in his Purdue career.

Also, worth noting that that this still probably isn't a head-to-head, either-or situation. Although I haven't gone to explicitly check, it seemed to me that Gillis and Evans spent about half their game time on the floor togeether.

Evans will get better. But based on how he's done last night and so far this season against mostly lower-level competition, I just don't see how he has yet earned much floor time in close games or against big-time teams. Perhaps soon, but he's just not there yet, IMO.
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I'm willing to bet that the gravity exerted by Big Zach led to a lot of Gillis's effectiveness. Duke doesn't have that gravitational pull right now. I don't think (m)any of Gillis's shots are bad per sé, but they're coming to him in a different way than when he was at Purdue, which may affect how he shoots. I was happy to see that right after Spatola dinged him for "not doing anything else" Gillis hauled in 5 boards for the game. If he hits one more 3 in this game, he'd be 2-5, and his performance would feel pretty normal, so maybe he's not far away from playing like the guy Jon recruited.
 
CDu said:
So my thoughts:

1. Defense was once again excellent. That seems to be the calling card for this group. Brown is just exceptional on that end of the floor. But the entire team is contributing.

2. The offense is struggling. We are just really unable to get easy looks. Every drive to the basket feels heavily contested, which suggests that we aren’t fooling anyone. The only open looks we are getting are 3s when a drive is thwarted, which is why we have taken so many threes. That is a tough way to make a living offensively. Teams are contesting on the dribble handoffs, which is making it difficult for our guys to get downhill. And we don’t have the explosiveness to break teams down off the dribble (we are long and rangy, not so much quick-twitch explosive).

3. We also aren’t getting enough from Foster. He scored the opening bucket of each half but otherwise was pretty silent. That is putting a lot of pressure on Knueppel and Flagg.

4. The heavy reliance on the 3pt shot can mask bad offense (when we make them) or mask good offense (when we miss). Right now, I think though it is accurate. We don’t have a great offense. It isn’t terrible, thanks to having a ton of talent. But we are playing at the level of a fringe top-50 offense when you take the preseason priors out of the efficiency modeling calculations. We could really benefit from finding a way to get some easy baskets, because right now the offense is a real grind.

5. Thankfully, the defense is making things a real grind for our opponents. We are #1 in the country on that end. Hopefully that continues and the offense starts to figure things out.
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I agree with this. My one thought based on this analysis - that we have a great defense and are having trouble getting easy shots - is that perhaps we should try and play faster. We have the bodies, we have the defense and we don't look great in half court. So...

Also, I think making open shots more would help. Over the last few games, there are number of times where we worked to get good shots that missed. I know, I know....but apparently our staff tracks "potential" assists and according to Spatola, in the few games before last night, Cooper Flagg had three times as many "potential" assists as he did actual assists. That suggests we are missing a lot of good shots.
 
DevilByBirth said:
Gillis has to find his shot, hopefully sooner than later. From what I saw last night I don't see how Isiah isn't our 8th man. He played overall solid defense and shot well.
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I just feel every shot is rushed and he predetermines he is shooting before he receives the ball
 
Thurber Whyte said:
It happened two rows in front of me. An elderly gentleman lost consciousness and his wife and others tried to revive him, ultimately progressing to chest compressions. EMS arrived and continued to work on him. Apparently, Cameron Indoor Stadium also had a cardiologist on duty and he showed up. As they were preparing to stretcher him out, he came to. After evaluating him further, they were able to get him on his feet and, with support, get him out that way. It ended much better than it started so, hopefully, the prognosis is good.
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You’re always near a cardiologist in Cameron.
 
FosterCoachK82 said:
Not necessarily. I think he is just adjusting to college ball. Games against high-quality seniors who are 5-7 years older than him are a big adjustment. He will be much better by the end of the year. I expect he will compete for all-ACC by his sophomore year.
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Does this mean he's coming back next year? Best news all day. ;)
 
Watched this morning. Had a hot date last night, and this girl is out-competing Duke for my attention. More about her than Duke.

This was treated as a scrimmage game and there were some things to take away. Spatola said Duke is 7 deep. And that's right. Not getting a ton from Gillis. And I also agree I want my best players playing 35+ minutes a game. I want Kon and Flagg playing. Proctor was 3-10 last night, but he has been excellent in his off the ball role. I am intensely enamored of Kon"s game and think he can be great even when not scoring. I also think he is figuring it out and love running the offense through him. Flagg does a little bit of everything and I am here for that. Foster does seem to be kind of playing himself into form. I didn't know he was shelved until August. James has been excellent off the bench and I love him in that role. Also it is best to think of Maluach and Brown as 1 player. Together they have been very productive.

All told, I really like the effort and potential. Interesting matchup against Auburn. Excited about this one.
 
CDu said:
So my thoughts:

1. Defense was once again excellent. That seems to be the calling card for this group. Brown is just exceptional on that end of the floor. But the entire team is contributing.

2. The offense is struggling. We are just really unable to get easy looks. Every drive to the basket feels heavily contested, which suggests that we aren’t fooling anyone. The only open looks we are getting are 3s when a drive is thwarted, which is why we have taken so many threes. That is a tough way to make a living offensively. Teams are contesting on the dribble handoffs, which is making it difficult for our guys to get downhill. And we don’t have the explosiveness to break teams down off the dribble (we are long and rangy, not so much quick-twitch explosive).

3. We also aren’t getting enough from Foster. He scored the opening bucket of each half but otherwise was pretty silent. That is putting a lot of pressure on Knueppel and Flagg.

4. The heavy reliance on the 3pt shot can mask bad offense (when we make them) or mask good offense (when we miss). Right now, I think though it is accurate. We don’t have a great offense. It isn’t terrible, thanks to having a ton of talent. But we are playing at the level of a fringe top-50 offense when you take the preseason priors out of the efficiency modeling calculations. We could really benefit from finding a way to get some easy baskets, because right now the offense is a real grind.

5. Thankfully, the defense is making things a real grind for our opponents. We are #1 in the country on that end. Hopefully that continues and the offense starts to figure things out.
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Great takes CDu. I saw a post with Jon's presser and the poster mentioned Jon saying he's not calling set plays. He's letting the players read what the defense is doing and running plays themselves. That could very well be the problem with 3 freshmen and a sophomore in the starting lineup. I hope there is a change in practice Monday and Tuesday because we need to hold serve at home against a really good team.

GoDuke!
 
jv001 said:
Great takes CDu. I saw a post with Jon's presser and the poster mentioned Jon saying he's not calling set plays. He's letting the players read what the defense is doing and running plays themselves. That could very well be the problem with 3 freshmen and a sophomore in the starting lineup. I hope there is a change in practice Monday and Tuesday because we need to hold serve at home against a really good team.

GoDuke!
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I thought that was odd regardless, but especially so given how disorganized our end-of-games have been. Saying that approach of players "figuring it out" now will make us better in March is also strange. It's like a teacher not helping their students and saying the Fs will help them in the final.
 
bluedevilwildcats said:
I thought that was odd regardless, but especially so given how disorganized our end-of-games have been. Saying that approach of players "figuring it out" now will make us better in March is also strange. It's like a teacher not helping their students and saying the Fs will help them in the final.
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I kinda agree. If Youre not gonna coach the young guys harder, hands-on, so they can “figure it out” on their own, and you don’t have to coach the vets as hard because they get it already, then when exactly does the heavier, hands on coaching happen exactly and of whom?
 
tommy said:
I kinda agree. If Youre not gonna coach the young guys harder, hands-on, so they can “figure it out” on their own, and you don’t have to coach the vets as hard because they get it already, then when exactly does the heavier, hands on coaching happen exactly and of whom?
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Yup, comes across as a coach maybe outsmarting himself
 
CDu said:
So my thoughts:

1. Defense was once again excellent. That seems to be the calling card for this group. Brown is just exceptional on that end of the floor. But the entire team is contributing.

2. The offense is struggling. We are just really unable to get easy looks. Every drive to the basket feels heavily contested, which suggests that we aren’t fooling anyone. The only open looks we are getting are 3s when a drive is thwarted, which is why we have taken so many threes. That is a tough way to make a living offensively. Teams are contesting on the dribble handoffs, which is making it difficult for our guys to get downhill. And we don’t have the explosiveness to break teams down off the dribble (we are long and rangy, not so much quick-twitch explosive).

3. We also aren’t getting enough from Foster. He scored the opening bucket of each half but otherwise was pretty silent. That is putting a lot of pressure on Knueppel and Flagg.

4. The heavy reliance on the 3pt shot can mask bad offense (when we make them) or mask good offense (when we miss). Right now, I think though it is accurate. We don’t have a great offense. It isn’t terrible, thanks to having a ton of talent. But we are playing at the level of a fringe top-50 offense when you take the preseason priors out of the efficiency modeling calculations. We could really benefit from finding a way to get some easy baskets, because right now the offense is a real grind.

5. Thankfully, the defense is making things a real grind for our opponents. We are #1 in the country on that end. Hopefully that continues and the offense starts to figure things out.
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Do you really see many plays called and run? That's always been my contention with last few years of K and maybe now of Scheyer. You got five elite guys and to me when you can't overpower guys in individual matchups you need to rely on old fashioned plays. Anyone agree or not?
 
jv001 said:
Great takes CDu. I saw a post with Jon's presser and the poster mentioned Jon saying he's not calling set plays. He's letting the players read what the defense is doing and running plays themselves. That could very well be the problem with 3 freshmen and a sophomore in the starting lineup. I hope there is a change in practice Monday and Tuesday because we need to hold serve at home against a really good team.

GoDuke!
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I see this comment now...after i made to comment above...my thoughts while you'd hope players could read the defense and running plays themselves is admirable...they gave up the QB calling plays a long time ago and I can't help but believe the coaches can see the defenses better than the players in the game, especially the coaches we have on our bench
 
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