Jay Williams: ‘Kyrie Irving is the best player to ever come out of Duke’

The best basketball player ever to call Cameron Indoor Stadium home is one who spent relatively little time in the Blue Devils uniform – at least according to Jay Williams.

Williams, a former Duke basketball standout and ESPN analyst, tweeted on Sunday that Kyrie Irving is “the best player to ever come out of Duke Men’s Basketball. #Respect.”

Williams allowed that “Christian (Laettner) was a beast, but Grant Hill and Kyrie Irving were and are incredible people on top of ball.”

Irving, 25, a 6-2 guard from West Orange, N.J., played 11 games for Duke in the 2010-11 season, with eight starts, according to the university. He missed 26 games because of a toe injury on his right foot.

Irving scored in double figures in all 11 games he played, with three games of 20 or more points and one 30-point game. He had five or more assists in four games, and nine assists in two games.

Returning from his injury in the second round of the 2011 NCAA tournament, Irving scored a team-high 14 points and had four rebounds, one assist, one blocked shot and two steals in 20 minutes off the bench against Hampton.

Irving had a team high again with 28 points in a NCAA round of 16 loss against No. 17 Arizona.

In December of that season, Irving scored 31 points on 8-of-12 shooting, was 2-of-3 from behind the 3-point line and went 13-of-16 from the free-throw line against No. 6 Michigan State – just the fourth time a Duke freshman scored 30 or more points in a game and tied for the second most. His 13 free throws were a freshman record, and his 16 attempts tied for the most by a freshman.

At the start of the season, Irving was named the CBE Classic MVP after averaging 14.5 points, 4.0 rebounds, 6.0 assists and 1.5 steals per game in the four games. In the championship game, Irving posted 17 points, five rebounds, six assists and two steals in the against No. 4 Kansas State. He made 7 of 7 free throws in that game.

Irving was the No. 1 overall pick in the first round of the 2011 draft by the Cleveland Cavaliers, where he played until this year, when he joined the Boston Celtics. He was part of the 2016 Cavs championship team, is a four-time NBA All-Star and was NBA Rookie of the Year.

This story was originally published November 21, 2017 at 3:27 PM with the headline "Jay Williams: ‘Kyrie Irving is the best player to ever come out of Duke’."