Quotes & Notes - January 25
vs. Miami, at Virginia Tech
After every game I do three things: watch the press conference, read the quotes, and study the box score. Quotes & Notes is my wrap-up of the most recent games of the Duke season, including postgame quotes, stats, and other thoughts.
Quotes
“Great win for us. I was told before it was the 500th consecutive sellout that we’ve had and what an amazing place to play basketball games. Cameron is one of a kind. I think it showed today. Really proud of the overall effort. I thought everybody on the team stepped up at different moments and for me, Dereck Lively, he’s been working his butt off every day with Coach [Amile] Jefferson. He keeps getting better and for him to have six offensive rebounds, 10 rebounds overall, five blocked shots. Thought we had to change our defenses up. Miami is an explosive team. You never relax when you’re playing against them and to hold them to 66 points, I’m really proud of our defense and the job that we did. Coach Lucas, Jai, has been our defensive coordinator. He actually had the scout for Miami as well. He’s been huge for us in what we’ve done, so happy to answer any questions but really proud of the effort.”
- Coach Scheyer after the Miami win
“He had a great look from the wing, and that wasn’t even necessarily the play. We wanted the ball in [Kyle Filipowski’s] hands, good things happen, really almost every time he touched it we get either a wide open shot or he got a great look himself. And he made a read, made a really good pass to Tyrese [Proctor], they happened to get caught up on that initial action. And we’ll take that any day of the week. Tyrese is wide open….it’s right there. And sometimes it goes in and sometimes it doesn’t. But we were looking to put the ball in Flip’s hands.”
- Coach Scheyer on Duke’s possession at Virginia Tech down 75-77
Stats
Duke played two typical middle of January ACC games - down to the wire, hard fought contests. The Miami game had 14 lead changes and of course both games were decided in the final minute. At Virginia Tech was the first quick turnaround Duke has had in conference play. The Hokies are so difficult to guard, much less with only one day in between games. I feel badly for the guys after the tough loss in Blacksburg, but they showed great toughness in another learning experience.
After a conference low in assists-to-made field goal percentage at Clemson, the Blue Devils really shared the ball well in both games. Regarding the second half at Virginia Tech, Coach Scheyer regarded “And really, at halftime, just for us to dig down and get some stops, trust the pass, work together, I thought we had some beautiful connecting passes.” Coach mentioned it in his Friday press conference pre-Miami, but the other thing that obviously helps boost the assist percentage is to make shots. The ball movement and connecting passes will continue to help Duke get good looks and the guys should keep shooting them with confidence.
Miami and Virginia Tech had the two most efficient 3-point shooting performances Duke has faced so far this season. Any opponent shooting at that efficiency and volume is going to be difficult to beat. Duke was at least able to decrease both teams’ 3-point efficiency in the second half. Miami was at 1.25 points-per-shot (PPS) from 3 in the second half, while Virginia Tech was at 1.00 PPS. Credit goes to the Blue Devils for their improved communication and defensive adjustments on shooters.
Notes
I love Duke changing up their defensive looks. Coach Scheyer has talked about the need for this team to have a change-up pitch, with man-to-man being the fastball. I think we saw the positives of different defenses the past two games. The Blue Devils have shown 2-3, 1-3-1, and match-up zones in the half court, as well utilizing zone press (1-2-2) after made throws. Sometimes Duke will only go zone for one or two possessions, other times Coach will use zone for several minutes. Teams are so good at running their action and after seeing only one defense from the start of the game, offenses are able to develop a rhythm. Showing multiple looks helps put a team off balance and, from a preparation standpoint, requires your opponent to scout and practice for multiple defenses.
I don’t love more injuries for Duke. I know Jeremy and the staff will have to manage his toe for the rest of the season but it was so great to have him back, only to see Dariq Whitehead go down at Virginia Tech. Let me be clear up front, I do not bring up injuries as any kind of excuse, reason, or “we would have won if he played” attitude. Repeats previous sentence. However, more than one thing can be true. Injuries are not an excuse for any result but it is also incredibly difficult to develop and maintain continuity, communication, and feel with your teammates when guys miss multiple games and practices. So far this season, Duke has only played with their full team for 11 out of 20 games. I haven’t seen any new information on Dariq but I feel terrible for him. He was providing a big lift since returning from his preseason foot injury and it is a bummer to have your college career start with such adversity. Although Jaylen will continue to play, I didn’t want to skip over his broken nose - at minimum, it seems it may affect his minutes, and I love what he has brought to the floor. On the bright side, the Blue Devils do have depth and I know the guys will keep learning together and playing hard.
I loved listening to JJ Redick on the Knuckleheads podcast with Quentin Richardson and Darius Miles. JJ was candid, thoughtful, and has some great stories. It goes without saying but he’s a Duke legend. If you’ve never listened to QRich and DMiles, they have had a ton of great guests from all across basketball. In fact, I just saw they have Grant Hill as their guest this week so I look forward to giving that one a listen as well.
Thanks for reading, Go Duke!
Sources