DURHAM – Duke basketball this year is less Miami Heat circa LaBron James with stacked talent and more Golden State Warriors pre-Kevin Durant. The Blue Devils are a younger Steph Curry version of the Warriors with meshed teamwork, and that makes them more intriguing to watch as they chase their potential.
A year ago Duke merely needed to show up. The college basketball hoop world conceded victory and hung on every Zion Williams dunk.
This year’s Blue Devils need to show up as a team and play well together – the sum being greater than the parts. They are not only doing so with balance, depth and defense, they have done it for nine straight wins.
The Blue Devils (15-1, 5-0 ACC) rolled to a 90-59 win over Wake Forest (8-7, 1-4 ACC) Saturday night at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
The collective team is always more loveable than the bully on the block with stacked talent, but it’s not as easy as Duke is making it look this year with a 10-deep roster. Just look at Kentucky, the other program known for stockpiling lottery picks. The Wildcats are 12-3 and ranked an atypically low No. 14 in the nation.
“We played really well,” Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said. “Our defense was outstanding, especially on the perimeter. All five of our perimeter guys did a great job. Tre (Jones) was spectacular, but Jordan Goldwire continued to play at a high level … Cassius (Stanley) … the whole perimeter. Our team played well.”
Jones led the Blue Devils with 23 points and five assists. Stanley finished with 16 and Goldwire with 10. Off the bench, Jack White and Javin DeLaurier scored 11.
Eight of nine players seeing the court had scored by intermission. The only reason it wasn’t 10 was freshman guard/forward Wendell Moore, usually one of the first three off the bench, suffered a broken finger in the last game at Georgia Tech and is out indefinitely.
Five of the nine hit from three-point range: Tre Jones, Matthew Hurt, Cassius Stanley, Joe Baker (twice) and Jack White.
Four of the six three-pointers were within the game’s first eight minutes and White’s with 6:16 left in the half. Baker and White came off the bench to account for a perfect 3-of-3 among the Blue Devils’ 6-of-10 from the arc.
“On the scouting report for us was taking away some driving lanes for the drivers,” said Wake Forest coach Danny Manning, “but they had guys knock down shots.”
Duke has used nine starting lineups this year, and this time out returned to one for the first time since opening night. Backup point guard Jordan Goldwire joined starter Tre Jones and freshman Cassius Stanley in a three-guard lineup to match Wake Forest.
They throttled the Demon Deacons’ guards.
Senior Brandon Childress Jr., the leading scorer at 16.0 points a game, and redshirt senior Andrien White (8.0), were both scoreless at halftime.
Childress finished scoreless on 0-of-6 shooting with four assists and four turnovers in 26 minutes. White’s numbers were two points, one assist and two turnovers in 19.
Duke forced 12 first-half turnovers, 17 by the end of the night.
The first-half numbers tell the story since the game was over by then. The Blue Devils led 49-23 at halftime and outscored the Demon Deacons 41-36 in the second half. Duke has won three of its last four games by 30-plus margins.
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Tom Shanahan, Author: Raye of Light http://tinyurl.com/knsqtqu
— Book on Michigan State’s leading role in the integration of college football. It explains Duffy Daugherty’s untold pioneering role and debunks myths that steered recognition away from him to Bear Bryant.
http://shanahan.report/a/the-case-for-duffy-and-medal-of-freedom
Don’t believe the myths at Duffy Daugherty’s expense about Bear Bryant’s motivation to play the 1970 USC-Alabama game or myths about the Charlie Thornhill-for-Joe Namath trade. Bear Bryant knew nothing about black talent in the South while he dragged his feet on segregation.
http://www.shanahan.report/a/forty-four-underground-railroad-legacy-facts
http://shanahan.report/a/myths-that-grew-out-of-1970-alabama-game-with-usc
http://shanahan.report/a/mystery-solved-in-thornhill-and-namath-myth
David Maraniss, Pulitzer Prize winner and biographer; “History writes people out of the story. It’s our job to write them back in.”
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