How Duke basketball proved it could ‘win ugly’ and advance in the ACC Tournament
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Duke survived 80-79 vs. Florida State after a last-second miss by FSU.
- Duke leaned on rebounding, Isaiah Evans’ scoring and Cam Boozer’s inside play.
- Coaches and players emphasized execution and readiness for Clemson next.
There were only a few seconds to think about the possibilities, good or bad.
Duke’s Cameron Boozer had a baseline shot blocked. Florida State suddenly had the ball and was jetting down court, ready to create some March madness of its own in the 2026 ACC Tournament and take down the No. 1 team in the country.
FSU’s Robert McCray V had Duke’s Dame Sarr in his face but got off the pull-up 3-pointer to the right of the key. The shot looked tantalizingly good in the air, but was a little long, hitting off the back rim as the buzzer sounded.
Duke, the ACC’s regular-season winner, escaped with an 80-79 victory. Everyone in Duke blue could breathe again and start preparing for Clemson in Friday’s semifinals.
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Devils guard Isaiah Evans, who had scored 32 points, could only watch and had one thought: “I hope he don’t make it. I mean, what else do you do?
“I mean, it always looks good when it’s a buzzer beater. I’m like, ‘Oh … yes!’”
That was the Duke reaction, equal parts relief and satisfaction. The Devils could easily be headed back to Durham to rest up and prepare for the NCAA Tournament but will play on, facing Clemson after the Tigers’ own 80-79 win over UNC.
As for the ’Noles, they could have been a handful in the NCAAs, winning 10 of 12 before Thursday. At 18-15, though, that won’t happen, but the Seminoles left behind something of a basketball blueprint of how to play Duke, minus injured starters Caleb Foster and Patrick Ngongba.
“We came up the best game plan possible for playing the No. 1 team in the country,” first-year FSU coach Luke Loucks said. “I would probably bring the same game plan back tomorrow.
“It came down to one shot, and I’ll take that shot every day of the week with your best player getting a decent look at the end of the game.”
Loucks, who played for Leonard Hamilton at FSU and then was the choice to replace the FSU coaching legend, said he first thought about a timeout to set up a play.
“But we had blocked a shot, and we’re in transition, and I don’t know that we get a better look than the one we got,” he said. “Sometimes the ball goes in and sometimes it doesn’t.”
It didn’t this time, and Duke walked away the winner.
“It shows we can win ugly,” Cam Boozer said. “Obviously we don’t want to win ugly, but we can if we have to. They can junk it up and make it look ugly, but we can win ugly.”
For Duke, that meant owning the boards. It meant riding Evans’ outside touch and Boozer’s inside power. It meant fighting through Cayden Boozer’s foul problems and going point guard “by committee” as everyone, it seemed, was used to bring up the ball at times.
That included Evans, who now has twice set his scoring high this season against FSU — he had 28 in Duke’s 91-87 victory Jan. 3 in Tallahassee, Florida.
Cam Boozer always found himself surrounded, fighting through a thicket of arms and bodies, but found a way to score 23 points, drawing eight fouls along the way that earned him nine foul shots.
“We wanted to sit on his right hand, force him left,” Loucks said. “We tried to throw bodies at him, We tried to make him finish around the basket with his left hand.
“The problem was that even when he missed those shots, he’s so strong down there and such a grown man that he got his own rebounds a lot of times.”
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Clemson surely took notice of how the Duke game, more gritty than great, went down despite a thrilling ending. It’s now the Tigers’ chance to have another go at the Blue Devils after knocking out fourth-seeded UNC.
The Blue Devils stifled the Tigers 67-54 in their Feb. 14 game in Durham, limiting Clemson to 35% shooting.
Clemson might be wanting to make Duke sweat out another ugly game. But that’s not Duke’s plan.
“It’s March,” Evans said “It’s not time for any excuses. We just have to figure out how to execute Duke basketball, offensively and defensively.”
This story was originally published March 13, 2026 at 5:30 AM.
