Duke Stings The Yellow Jackets, 85-79

Well that was a strange one.

Duke got a tougher game from Georgia Tech than many people expected, winning just 85-79. Let’s dive in.

In the first half, the Yellow Jackets were red hot. The Yellow Jackets shot 56% on their threes and 68% overall. In particular, Duke couldn’t keep up with Kowacie Reeves, who hit 5-8 overall and 2-3 on his trees.

Things were just rolling for Tech and Duke couldn’t put a blanket on it.

Despite that though, the Blue Devils went into halftime down just 43-39 and with some pretty erratic play.

Duke was shooting just 37% overall and 300% from behind the line.

And Jon Scheyer shook his lineup up too, going with a three-guard lineup as Cayden Boozer took the starting spot from Nik Khamenia.

But in the second half, Tech’s heater cooled down. Part of it was just that you don’t stay that hot forever. Another part of it though was that Duke’s defense got tougher. At one point, Scheyer put Khamenia and Sarr in together, let them play at the top of a zone, and the Yellow Jackets were flummoxed by that.

Tech didn’t score a basket from the floor from the 17:31 mark to 10:44. And that speaks well of Duke’s renewed defensive tenacity, but despite that, Duke was up just 61-59 when Chas Kelley hit a three.

Still, though the lead fell to just 1 a couple of times, Georgia Tech never caught up again.

On the flip side of that though, Duke built a 7 point lead twice and could not quite pull away.

Partly that’s because Georgia Tech has solid interior defenders in Baye Ndongo and
Mouhamed Sylla. They’re both tall, solidly built and athletic.

However, Tech had another problem that emerged in the first half with Ndongo, Sylla and backup Cole Kerouac all ended up with two fouls. Kerouac finished with four, Sylla with three and Ndongo with two.

As talented as they are, Ndongo and Sylla managed just 4 and 8 points respectively and Ndongo had just 4 rebounds while Sylla grabbed 8.

This worked to Duke’s advantage, as the Devils outrebounded the Yellow Jackets 42-28 and just pounded the offensive boards, grabbing 21 on that end.

Obviously part of that was just missing 38 shots of course, but the Devils showed a lot of heart to keep after it. On one memorable play with 11:29 to play ,the following happened: Cayden Boozer missed a three. Cameron Boozer got the rebound. Khamenia missed a three. Boozer got the rebound but missed the followup. He got another rebound and missed again. Sarr got a rebound and he missed the follow up. Then Maliq Brown got it and hit a host.

The bad news? They couldn’t get anything to go down. The good news? They wouldn’t give up until they finally got a basket.

So clearly, from an aesthetic point of view, there was a lot lacking in this one. Duke could have been cleaner in a lot of ways. The bottom line though is a win and they got that. But that’s not all they got. Here are some other things we really liked:

• Patrick Ngongba showed a ton of heart. He finished with 11 points and 9 boards and you might think, okay, average. Wrong. That guy fought inside against Tech’s bigs and without him, Duke would have been in serious trouble. No pun intended but he was huge for Duke.
• Isaiah Evans didn’t shot well, but his shot will come around. What he did do was to continue to show growth as a basketball player as opposed to a shooter. Anyone can learn to shoot. For a guy with his build to get after it like he has is great. He’s still painfully skinny but he’s throwing his body around like he has a spare. Love it.
• We’ve seen this a couple of times this season, but Cayden Boozer’s winner gene really came through against Tech. He made big plays down the stretch that you’d expect from an older player. He did have one bad turnover where he must have thought a teammate was going one way but no one was there. That’s a fair tradeoff for the rest of the heart he showed down the stretch.
• Caleb Foster continues to be steady and, most importantly, confident. He’s playing like you want a veteran guard to play.
• It’s old news at this point, but Cameron Boozer was just tough in winning time. He showed poise beyond his years even though he also showed a lot of frustration. Like his brother, he just understands winning.

Notes – Cameron Boozer finished with 26 points, 12 rebounds and 4 turnovers continuing a bad recent trend…he’s had 14 in his last three games…Ngongba had a huge block down the stretch…we’re not sure what’s up with Ndongo, but he’s regressed…it might be injuries…he finished 2-6 and had just the 4 boards…Duke shot poorly from the line, just 24-35 but Evans was 7-7…Cayden Boozer finished with 13 points, 5 boards and 3 assists…

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