Have the Blue Devils found their groove? How No. 7 Virginia will be a test for Duke.
Getting two wins to forge a winning record, after having not been below .500 in two decades, was big enough for Duke over the last six days.
The work they did to get it, followed by the satisfaction of dominating N.C. State and Wake Forest in road games, showed the important progress the Blue Devils certainly needed this month.
“They did in the game what they were rehearsing to do,” Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said Monday, looking back at Saturday’s 69-53 win over N.C. State. “That’s a big thing. In other words in order to get there, there had to be a big commitment in practice to get that done. And they did it.”
Such accomplishments are more important this season than perhaps in any other years for Duke (9-8, 7-6 ACC).
Just two weeks earlier, following a 77-75 loss at Miami on Feb. 1, a clearly frustrated Krzyzewski criticized his team for not competing at a high level and for not heeding warnings about preparation.
“I thought we were soft and I saw it in practice yesterday and tried to take steps to change that and we were not able to change it,” Krzyzewski said that night. “I’m really disappointed in our team. They did not play like a Duke basketball team tonight and obviously I’m responsible for that.”
Duke lost that game to Miami, a team mired at the bottom of the ACC standings, just two days after an impressive 79-53 win over Clemson. The Blue Devils thought they were back, ready to string wins together and right their season.
Instead, the loss at Miami started a three-game losing streak that left the Blue Devils with their first losing record since November 1999.
Duke on defense
That losing streak ended when Duke played one of its better defensive games of the season while topping N.C. State. Krzyzewski and his staff emphasized defense, making adjustments to their ball-screen coverage in man-to-man sets, after the Blue Devils lost 91-87 to North Carolina and 93-89 to Notre Dame in their previous two games.
According to KenPom.com advanced statistics, the Tar Heels averaged 1.2 points per possession in beating Duke. The Irish were even better at 1.33.
The Wolfpack managed just 0.87 in the same category, the first time Duke had held a team below one point per possession since Clemson produced 0.82 while losing to the Blue Devils.
“They were much more together, talking better, protecting the lane better,” Krzyzewski said of his team’s play against N.C. State. “Much more physical. We got loose balls. They rehearsed the game plan and then they executed it.”
Beating Wake Forest 84-60 on Wednesday night at Winston-Salem offered more of that improvement. The Demon Deacons scored 0.98 points per possession, while Duke’s offense was exceptional in scoring 1.33 points per possession.
The ball-screen adjustments allow 7-0 freshman center Mark Williams, or whichever other big man is manning the post, to stay down low near the basket rather than needing to come out and slow a ball handler.
“We not putting our bigs under so much pressure to stop the ball,” Duke sophomore forward Wendell Moore said Friday. “He can just protect the rim.”
Duke is playing far better, far more together, than it did when February started.
“They’re getting accustomed,” Krzyzewski said after the Wake Forest game. “They’ve formed a little chemistry. I think when you play that hard on the defensive end, you play better offense. You’re more physical and you run the offense harder. You can’t play that hard on defense and then not play hard on offense.”
For Duke to salvage this season and play like the NCAA tournament team the Blue Devils want to be, executing the game plan, particularly on defense, is a must.
The last time Duke beat a team that scored more than a point per possession in a game was Wake Forest in their Jan. 9 meeting. While losing 79-68 to Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium last month, the Demon Deacons scored 1.05 points per possession.
Momentum for the Blue Devils
Duke’s play against Wake earlier this week, by building on its strong play against N.C. State, gives it needed momentum entering a tough stretch of games. No. 7 Virginia comes to Cameron Indoor Stadium for Saturday night’s 8 pm game followed by Syracuse for a 7 p.m. game Monday night.
Louisville, on Feb. 27 at 6 p.m. at Cameron, is next after that for Duke.
All three of those teams are above Duke in the ACC standings and the NET ratings the NCAA tournament committee uses to divvy out at-large bids.
“Knock on wood, we can keep it going,” Krzyzewski said. “We’re getting contributions from everybody.”
Last month, after losing three games in a row to drop out of the top 25 for the first time since 2016, the Blue Devils played well in beating Georgia Tech and Clemson at home. But they followed that up with three more losses, beginning with the Miami game.
Now they’ve coupled wins together again and need to keep their strong play going as the regular season draws to a close over the next two weeks.
“The season hasn’t gone how we’ve wanted, but we just try to keep our head down and keep working every day,” said Duke sophomore forward Matthew Hurt, the team’s leading scorer at 18.3 points per game. “Don’t take a day off and we’re not trying to listen to the outside, the social media, what everyone else says but us. The most important thing is us, and if we just focus on ourselves getting better and better every day, whether it’s the weight room, whether it’s on the court – everything. Our mentality is getting better each day. Just win the day, I like to say.”
Virginia at Duke
When: 8 p.m., Saturday
Where: Cameron Indoor Stadium, Durham
Watch: ESPN
This story was originally published February 19, 2021 at 1:01 PM.