Clemson kept up with Duke for the first 13 minutes or so and was down just 19-18. And then the bomb hit: Duke ripped off a 21-4 run to take a 41-22 halftime lead, en route to a 73-61 victory. But that’s misleading, because Duke totally controlled this game.
In the first half, the Blue Devils limited the Tigers to just 6 made baskets (6-27, for 22%), and only 4 baskets inside the three-point line (Clemson shot 2-13 from the bonusphere, for 15%, in the first half).
They did this despite their best defender,
Maliq Brown, playing just 8 minutes due to two first-half fouls.
Cameron Boozer was the focus of the defense, as usual, and he got to the line 10 times, hitting 8 of those attempts. He actually only had two baskets before halftime.
Isaiah Evans, who carried the offense Thursday night with a career-high 32, had just 4 points in the first half, but he had 7 rebounds in the opening period. He finished with just 6, and 4 of those were from the line, but he also grabbed 10 rebounds for the game. This is a huge leap for Evans, who last season averaged just 1.1 per game, and had 18 games with none.
So this game was essentially settled in the first half. Clemson has overachieved, as the Tigers tend to do, and the only way this team was coming back from a deficit like that was with a huge three-point binge.
Didn’t happen.
Clemson had 2 three-pointers in the first half and finished hitting 7-25. To their credit, they did cut the lead from 52-22 with 13:11 to play down to the final 12-point margin, but they never seriously threatened.
For the game, Clemson shot 28% from behind the line and 33% (18-55) overall.
RJ Godfrey shot reasonably well, hitting 6-11, and Jestin “Time” Porter hit 4-7.
Otherwise, it was a difficult night for Brownell, as you may have noticed from his body language.
Duke’s win was largely built around defense, but obviously not solely. The offense is potent too. It’s just that it wasn’t the same as it was Thursday night.
Boozer had his normal sort of night, with 24 points, 14 rebounds and 5 assists, and Evans had an off night, shooting just 1-9, but other players stepped up.
Cayden Boozer had a career-high 16 points, but the biggest boost may have come from Nik Khamenia, who finished with 14 points, 6 rebounds, and a beautiful assist to Cayden Boozer. We watched him in FIBA play last summer, and his passing was absolutely beautiful. He hasn’t done it that much, but does he have it in his bag?
Just wait. He’s really got that.
Those three players accounted for 54 of Duke’s 73 points, and will make it more difficult for Virginia to focus as much on Cameron Boozer in Saturday’s ACC Championship.
One interesting thing about Jon Scheyer’s Duke is that turnovers aren’t that big a part of the equation. Clemson had just 6, and Florida State had 10. UNC had 14 in the regular season finale. We’re not going to run the numbers right now, but it’s not like this team is forcing tons of turnovers. Duke is just strangling teams in the half court, forcing them to play deep into the shot clock, only to force something up. We’d love to see a breakdown on the percentage of shots against Duke that are in the last 5 seconds of the shot clock. Our hunch is that the Blue Devils certainly lead the ACC there, and possibly the nation.
It’s interesting too that against Florida State, Brown had 12 rebounds, and against Clemson, Evans basically just picked that up with 10.
People watch him because when he’s hot, he’s on fire, but somewhat under the radar, he’s gone from a shooter to a really skilled basketball player. If this were last season, a poor shooting night would see him to the end of the bench.
No more.
With the win, Duke advances to play Virginia for the ACC Championship onSaturday evening. As always, there are no guarantees, and Duke is down two starters. However, they’ve had time to figure things out a bit, and with some quick reps, too, with two games in two days.
They’ll need to control fouls obviously, and continue to do the good things they’ve done, but their defense gives them a chance against any opponent, and Cameron Boozer is sort of the queen of the basketball chessboard.
Notes – We can’t verify this right now, but in his first four seasons, Scheyer has made the finals three times won twice, and we’re not sure anyone else has ever done that…his career record is now 120-24…this was the best game we’ve seen so far from Khamenia and also Cayden Boozer…Thursday night, Duke looked shaky at times…not against Clemson…Clemson’s perimeter starters combined to shoot 5-24 (20.8%)…a lot of that was Dame Sarr, but he can’t guard three people at once…Virginia is going to be a serious challenge on Saturday…Duke will have to be very sharp to win that without Caleb Foster and Pat Ngongba…on the bright side though, it’s a night game so lots of rest…
Go to the DBR Boards to find Blue Healer Auctions | Drop us a lineDuke’s average record over the last 40 years with: 2 Boozers: 30-2 1 Boozer: 32-4 0 Boozers: 28-7
