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This week Duke’s men are touring the conference’s western reaches. The home crowds at California and Stanford have been the sparsest among the 18 stops on the ACC circuit, although the much-hyped Blue Devils are sure to be a big draw. Stanford was stuck in neutral for the decade prior to coach Kyle Smith’s arrival […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
Projecting the NCAA Tournament Bracket before March is a fool’s errand—a necessary caveat before embarking on any discussion of “bracketology.” And yet, projecting the bracket dominates the conversation amongst college basketball fans all year round (yes, there are even “Way Too Early” projected brackets in the offseason now!), so it’s impossible to ignore. These discussions […]
about 2 months ago | 2 reads
We’ll have a somewhat limited ACC Roundup today since the Duke-Cal game ended at around 1:00 A.M. Thanks, TV buddies! In Wednesday’s ACC Action, in the boring game, Pitt beat Georgia Tech 89-66, SMU got a miracle against Virginia Tech to win 77-76 and Stanford came back to shock UNC 95-90. We’ve been paying attention […]
about 2 months ago | 4 reads
Back in 1985, the Houston Rockets owned the #1 pick in that year’s draft and they were going to take the hometown hero, Hakeem Olajuwon, and as history showed, he worked out pretty well. The Portland Trail Blazers had the #2 pick and they called Indiana coach Bob Knight to ask him about Michael Jordan. […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
As we’ve seen more than once this season, Duke was not beautiful in the first half, but the Blue Devils locked down Cal in the second, winning 71-56. The Bears played pretty well in the first half, going up 13-7 and forcing 6 turnovers early before Duke really punched back. Cal did a nice job […]
about 2 months ago | 1 read
Tuesday’s games went more or less as expected. Clemson handled Boston College 74-50, Miami knocked off Notre Dame 81-69, Syracuse took care of Florida State 94-86 and Virginia beat Louisville 79-70. We weren’t sure what to expect from Louisville honestly and Mikel Brown is still out, which hurts. But Virginia shot out to a 14-0 […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
Ifeanyi Ufochukwu banged his knee up in practice recently and now it looks like he’s out for the season. He hasn’t played since the Niagara game, but it’s potentially a big deal. The 6-11 Ufochukwu accepted his role as insurance and as a practice player and he was reportedly doing a great job with the […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
The Duke-UNC rivalry has had some very intense moments over the years. The 1961 fight between Art Heyman and, well, everybody on the UNC bench was one. Heyman gleefully claimed that he hit Frank McGuire in the nuts and years later, he saw McGuire who told him, “it still hurts, Artie!” There was the Fred […]
about 2 months ago | 3 reads
Cooper Flagg and the Dallas Mavericks hosted the Brooklyn Nets Monday night and it was another solid game for the rookie from Duke. Dallas is currently without Anthony Davis, Kyrie Irving, Daniel Gafford and Dereck Lively, who looks to be out for the season after surgery, so that puts a lot of pressure on the […]
about 2 months ago | 3 reads
The Duke Blue Devils were able to hold off the SMU Mustangs, winning 82-75 on Saturday afternoon to move to 15-1 on the season and 4-0 in the ACC. Donald and Scott Rich recap everything about a perplexing game on Episode 786. The Blue Devils did great in certain aspects defensively, and got some great […]
about 2 months ago | 2 reads
The Duke Blue Devils are headed west for a long road trip in California. They begin with a game against the Cal Golden Bears on Wednesday night. Donald and Scott Rich preview ACC After Dark on DBR Bites #133. Cal has a decent record, but is coming off a series of road losses to UVA […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
Date 1/14 || Time 11:00 || Venue Haas Pavilion || Video ACC Network Duke enters the ACC era of West Coast travel this week with a trip to the Bay Area to take on Cal and Stanford. Cal is first and some of y’all are gonna need a nap because this one starts at 11:00 […]
about 2 months ago | 3 reads
The next time a prominent coach with a long record of success decides to retire, pseudo-sages will lament the impossible task confronting his or her successor. That’s been an article of faith ever since Gene Bartow replaced John Wooden at UCLA for the 1975-76 season. Bartow was essentially driven from the job as a failure […]
about 2 months ago | 1 read
Four games on tap Tuesday and our TV overlords serve up the best one first as Virginia visits Louisville, also BC at Clemson, Miami at Notre Dame, and Florida State at Syracuse. Under Tony Bennett, Virginia basically owned Louisville, and particularly Rick Pitino. One of the funniest things of the Bennett era was that every […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
When Patrick Ewing was coming up in the early 1990’s, no one fully understood how good he was. There was no YouTube, no social media, no clips, no hype tapes. People knew he was going to be good, but no one understood just how good. When Ewing got to Georgetown, they figured it out in […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
Del Harris had a long career in coaching and has been around basketball for his entire life, so when he ventures an opinion, people tend to listen. And what he told The Sporting News about Duke product Cooper Flagg will have people talking. Here’s what he said: “Cooper is the best I’ve actually seen since […]
about 2 months ago | 3 reads
In 1987, Duke and Maryland, then an ACC team, were heading in opposite directions. Duke had made the championship game the previous season. It had lost four starters but was still a Top 15 team. The previous summer, the night of the NBA Draft, Maryland’s Len Bias had died of a cocaine overdose after going […]
about 2 months ago | 2 reads
It took some doing, but Duke won Game 2 of the California trip, knocking off Stanford 67-60 and extending the win streak to eight games. The game started slow with Stanford taking a 15-12 lead after the first quarter but Duke rallied to take a 31-28 lead at the half. The Blue Devils led at […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
The Duke Blue Devils were able to hold off the SMU Mustangs, winning 82-75 on Saturday afternoon to move to 15-1 on the season and 4-0 in the ACC. Donald and Scott Rich recap everything about a perplexing game on Episode 786. The Blue Devils did great in certain aspects defensively, and got some great […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
In Saturday’s ACC Action, Boston College gave Louisville a fine game, losing 75-62, Virginia thumped Stanford 70-55, Syracuse took Pitt 83-72, Miami rolled past Georgia Tech 91-81, NC State laid waste to FSU 113-69, Virginia Tech slipped by Cal 78-75, Clemson took care of Notre Dame 76-61 and Wake Forest pushed UNC to the final […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
Trevor Keels has been somewhat quiet since leaving Duke in 2022 as a second-round draft pick of the New York Knicks. He probably could have used some more time in Durham but that was his decision and he’s still grinding away, trying to get to the league. His last G-League performance with the Sioux Falls […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
Duke has had some amazing defenders over the years. On Saturday, we saw a brilliant first half by Dame Sarr. In our estimation, it was the best half of defense by a Duke player since Tre Jones personally dismantled Syracuse for the first 5:30 before he injured his shoulder. Seriously. We’ve never seen a guard […]
about 2 months ago | 3 reads
Duke’s 82-75 win over SMU was not a work of art by any means, but it was notable for one thing in particular, and that was Dame Sarr’s first half defense, which was magnificent. Sarr put on a defensive performance in that half which was as fine as any we’ve seen since Tre Young personally […]
about 2 months ago | 1 read
In Saturday’s ACC Action, Boston College visits Louisville, Georgia Tech jets down to Miami, NC State and Florida State tangle in Tallahassee, Syracuse is at Pitt, Stanford checks in at Virginia, Cal is at Virginia Tech, Wake Forest buses down to UNC and Clemson visits Notre Dame. We don’t expect BC will have much of […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads
You know that tag line the Situational Ethics Conference likes to use – It Just Means More? Well, maybe…maybe not. According to Outkick.com, “The bowl season, including the College Football Playoff, has been a complete disaster, from start to finish. With the Ole Miss loss to Miami on Thursday night, the conference fell to 1-8 against non-SEC Power […]
about 2 months ago | 0 reads