Duke Takes Care Of BC, 67-49

You know that concern/complaint Duke fans have had this season about the Blue Devils starting slow? For at least one night, you can strike and reverse that, because Duke started Tuesday’s game against Boston College brilliantly, but trailed off significantly later.

Not that it mattered. Duke was by far the better team in this one as the Blue Devils won 67-49, despite a distinctly mediocre second half.

Cameron Boozer scoring the first five on a three and then a steal and a breakaway dunk.

The Blue Devils, dressed in Brotherhood uniforms that were dark blue rather than the traditional white and bright, bright Nike Jordans donated by Jayson Tatum, put the game out of reach fairly early.

Dame Sarr followed Boozer with a layup and a dunk and Duke was off to the races.

Duke scored 13 before BC scratched and there just wasn’t much the Eagles could do.

The Blue Devils finished the first half up 42-27 and the offense was at times dazzling. Duke rained threes and moved the ball beautifully, which led to 60.7% shooting for the half. The defense was solid too as it has been for most of the year.

It didn’t matter in the end, but in the second half, Duke’s offense struggled. It wasn’t anything obvious or that the Devils weren’t playing hard, but the shots stopped falling.

After the hot first half, Duke managed just 25 points and the shooting percentage basically fell by about half.

It wasn’t ideal, but keep in mind that at least two guys were sick a few days ago and Nikolas Khamenia got a bloody nose that didn’t look too pleasant.

And while you hope not, it would be very human for a young team to start thinking about Saturday’s drive over to Chapel Hill.

We’re not putting Boston College down, because they played hard and Fred Payne was impressive (we could imagine that guy turning up somewhere next year like, say, UCLA or Baylor and having a significant impact). They worked hard, they have some quickness…but as Churchill said about the pudding, this team has no theme.

They have some quickness and Donald Hand has had his moments this season, though not so much Saturday. Luka Toews is a quick little guard who could develop, but he’s not there yet.

But while they have heart, their talent is not sufficient. That’s a lot to overcome.

Duke saw some nice plays from everyone at times. Boozer finished with a double-double (15 points and 12 rebounds), while Patrick Ngongba finished with 9 and 9.

The second half was nothing to write home about, but the Blue Devils won, they’re still in first place and 1 basket away from being 22-0. Life is good.

Notes – Dame Sarr has struggled around the basket all season but hit his first two shots in the paint…Duke assisted on 15-24 baskets…this game was not intense from wire to wire, but we still saw improvement and at times, real excellence…as noted above, Boston College has more talent than you might think, but not enough to win in Cameron…