Blue Devils win comfortably in preseason opener
Given the success of last season’s freshman class at Duke, which delivered the program’s fifth NCAA basketball championship, coach Mike Krzyzewski has downplayed expectations for this year’s rookie group and shrugged off comparisons to its most recent predecessors.
As one of only two coaches to lead teams to back-to-back NCAA titles in the past 40 years, Krzyzewski knows all too well the pitfalls and pressures of those kinds of comparisons, even for a team ranked fourth nationally in the preseason.
After Friday night’s debut against Florida Southern, a comfortable 112-68 blowout in a preseason exhibition in Cameron Indoor Stadium that matched the reigning Division I and Division II champions, the freshmen had better get used to the comparisons soon.
On first impressions, it looks like some combination of Brandon Ingram, Derryck Thornton, Luke Kennard and Chase Jeter are ready to assume the mantle of Freshman Big Three that was worn so comfortably by Jahlil Okafor, Justise Winslow and Tyus Jones last season.
Thornton, a point guard from California who reclassified out of high school a year early, led the way with 22 points on 8-of-13 shooting, including 4-of-7 from 3-point range, and didn’t have a turnover in 29 minutes.
“Overall I thought (the freshmen) did well,” Krzyzewski said. “(Thornton) had a lot of energy. He pushed it and made really good decisions. When he had his feet set, he knocked down every three. He played really well. He played with energy.”
Ingram, a 6-foot-9 Kinston native, is the heir apparent to Okafor as a preseason All-ACC pick and freshman of the year. Whether he can measure up to Okafor’s ACC player of the year performance is another story, but he was the only freshman to start against Florida Southern. He finished with 16 points and six rebounds.
Ingram, the No. 2 recruit in the nation, switched from the “3” to the “4” depending upon the other personnel on the floor. He got to show off his ball-handling skills on the final Duke possession of the first half, bringing the ball upcourt with 11 seconds remaining and driving the lane for a layup by posting his perimeter defender. He also got to the foul line frequently, where he went 8-of-11.
The Duke faithful didn’t have to wait long to get a look at the other three highly touted freshmen, though. Thornton, Kennard and Jeter entered at the 16:09 mark, and Jeter made his presence known immediately with a nifty reverse layup off a baseline drive, adding the free throw for a three-point play. Kennard, although he struggled with his outside shooting touch (5-of-14 overall), added 14 points, while Jeter had seven.
Otherwise Krzyzewski went with veterans in his starting lineup – Grayson Allen and Matt Jones in the backcourt, and Marshall Plumlee and Amile Jefferson in the posts – and they supplied veteran play. Jones hit from 3-point range en route to 15 points, Plumlee powered inside for 14 points and nine rebounds, Jefferson added 13 opportunistic points on 5-of-5 shooting and snared 12 rebounds for good measure, and Allen, the Final Four hero, spent most of his time running the offense at the point but still managed nine points.
Although this is the third-tallest Duke team Krzyzewski has ever had, and Ingram saw a lot of action at the wing, a small lineup might be Duke’s best one, with Ingram and Jefferson or Plumlee up front and Jones, Allen and Thornton on the perimeter. That unit was better in transition when Florida Southern went to a small lineup, and Duke ran off a 6-0 spurt in just 55 seconds to take control in the final three minutes of the first half. The Blue Devils expanded a 12-point margin to 64-40 by intermission.
“We’ll just play Brandon all over,” Krzyzewski said. “He’s a really good player. And especially tonight because it was tough to have two big guys in there a lot of the game. For a good portion of the game, when we got the lead we had five perimeter guys in there.”
Duke plays another Division II team in an exhibition Wednesday night when it hosts Livingstone. The Blue Devils open the season Nov. 13-14 against Siena and Bryant in the 2K Classic Benefiting the Wounded Warrior Project.
This story was originally published October 30, 2015 at 9:50 PM with the headline "Blue Devils win comfortably in preseason opener."