TWO DUKIES PICK THE ACC
Volume XIII, Episode 3
November 17, 2009
ANOTHER BRANCH OF THE UNIVERSITY OF THE LOCAL STATE EDITION

Matt’s comments in blue.
duhomme's comments in red. 


NORTH CAROLINA-CHARLOTTE (2-0, 0-0 Atlantic 10) v. #9 DUKE (2-0, 0-0)

Okay, so we promised standalone, dedicated recaps.  Well, you heard the reasons why that didn’t happen the first time out (hereinafter the “weak excuse”).  And this time - - it’s two games in two days, and it’s like, early in the season and junk?  Soooooo I will now incorporate my recap into this material.  And thus:

A few thoughts . . . .    

DUKE MVP:  Kyle Singler, who racked up 23 points and 11 boards, shot 8-14 from the floor, added two threes in five tries and nailed all five of this freebies, while only committing two errors and one personal foul in 36 minutes.  Not bad.  I thought that the shot selection was great, his moves to the rack were outstanding, and in the first half he was Hoovering every loose ball.  I also think that he appears well-conditioned and ready to make a serious run this season.  Remember last year, when he came out looking like a mutant in the first game, then rapidly lost muscle mass before our eyes as he dealt with the associated felons that ACC coaches of this charming era assign to pack the post?  Well, this season I think he’s going to hold up much better.  And his defense was solid, too, despite being matched up against a much smaller guy all night.  Very very impressive. 

HONORABLE MENTION:  Miles Plumlee, who, apart from a few ticky-tack fouls, played a very strong game and made his presence known throughout the lane.  I really enjoyed the two late dunks on feeds from Czyz (!!) and Kelly.  Miles appears to have wide receiver hands, which can’t hurt.  His defense was rock-solid and his free-throw stroke very smooth.  Also, Jon Scheyer was 7-7 from the line and recorded five handouts against no turnovers.  It wasn’t his best shooting game, but it didn’t really need to be.  I also enjoyed the Andre Dawkins show, and appreciated that K didn’t yank him after all those quick bombs he put up in the first half. 

NEEDS WORK:  After this one, I don’t have too many complaints.  Duke started slow, of course, spotting the Cleers a 6-0 lead and encouraging Cliff Ellis to fax his freshly updated resume to several C-USA schools, but the Blue Devils recovered swiftly on defense and found a rhythmic rotation that was very, very difficult for Coastal to crack.  Whenever I mention that Duke should play more zone, some wizard always casts a spell of stupid and rejoins that zone = fewer defensive rebounds.  Are there hard stats to back this up?  Seriously.  Because in most zone looks that I see, the number of defenders around the basket is increased, leading to easier bounds.  And that’s exactly what Duke saw on a lot of missed CC shots against the 2-3.  Other than that . . . 12 boners was too much Cialis against a team that didn’t really mount (heh) much in the way of pressure.  Five of the miscues were authored by Lance Thomas.  Most the team’s giveaways were just mental mistakes, and aren’t cause for alarm.  Oh, and I guess Duke’s relatively low score was a tad disappointing - - but I thought it was pretty clear that Cliff was trying to limit possessions.  Add in some errant Duke arcsmanship, and there you have it.   

GOOD STAT:  20-24 (83.3%) on free throws, and three of those misses came courtesy of Zoubeard (who wasn’t even close on his two tries - - wait, I thought he really improved in this area last season??) and Jordan Davidson, who short-armed one but neatly canned the other.  Other than that, only LT missed one.  By the way, I neglected to mention that Lance looked like a serious basketball player on several drives to the metal in the second half.  Great to see! 

BAD STAT:  6-23 (26.1%) from the Land of Tripledom isn’t going to scare anyone.  Now, this LARGE Duke team isn’t really in desperate need of the three-pointer to keep defenses honest, like most recent Blue Devil editions have been, because Singler and Scheyer have midrange games, and there should be an abundance of second-chance points this season.  But still . . . let’s get that percentage up.  Ryan Kelly impressed me in a number of ways, but his long-distance shot is really odd-looking - - almost a set shot.  Obviously, if that’s how the kid shoots, I’m not going to say he needs to change his whole personal metric after missing four shots, but yeah - - those didn’t look good. 

BAD MATT:  Amazingly, I don’t think there was a huge amount that I got wrong in the preview, but I probably should have mentioned that Nolan’s absence was particularly keen in this game since CC relied on guard play and dribble-drives.  It will be good to see Mr. Smith back in uniform on Tuesday “night.”  P.S., can anyone explain to me why the home team is playing first, not second, in these two doubleheaders?  Seems like there should be an opening act (no offense to any of the other teams intended), and then the main performance.  This is particularly true on Tuesday, when the consolation game will evidently follow the main matchup.  My understanding fails.

STRIPE GRIPES:  Not too many, if any at all beyond mere grumbles about close charge/blocks and such.  Dwayne Gladden is an official that I’m always happy to see on a Duke game, and Doug Sirmons is very competent and not a showboater.  Joe Lindsay is a poor official, but he didn’t factor into the outcome.  One nifty thing about this crew?  They routinely made a visual indication of the type of personal foul that they called immediately after whistling it, within view of the television picture, in addition to then making the same indication to the scorer’s table (which, of course, is never pictured by any telecast unless it’s accidental).  You always get this on charges and especially blocks, but hardly ever with, say, a holding foul or a hack ("illegal use of the hands").  Given how fast the game moves, I enjoy learning what sort of foul the zebra stopping the play detected, and the immediate hand signals let you know right away.  This is probably not a big deal to most people, and I certainly realize that, but I enjoyed it.  Maybe it’s some sort of NCAA-wide point of emphasis this season, but I doubt that. 

DENOUNCING THE ANNOUNCING:  For someone who clearly hates Duke so much, it sure must rile Jimmy Dykes that the Espenators-in-Chief keep sending him to cover Blue Devil games - - unless he just gets a private frisson of pleasure from being so close to Chapel Hill.  In any case, here’s what we learned, and all we learned, from the Dykester:

(1)        UNC-CH has an excellent chance to repeat, merely because of Hemorrhoy.  He can turn water into wine, that guy.  (And, although Dykes would never say it even if he was clubbed by the 2x4 of Clues, Roid will need to do just that this season just to make the Sweet Sixteen.)                       

(2)        Singler and Scheyer play lots of minutes!  They practice hard and they play hard!  This is a problem!  Duke needs that third scoring option!  But even if such an option emerges, Singler and Scheyer are going to play a looooooooooooot of minutes!! 

The second meme is particularly distressing, and not for its substance; after all, virtually nothing that Dykes points out is actually relevant or of any concern.  However, you can bet your bottom dollar that we will see Dykes on ESPN Duke telecasts at least seven to eight more times.  This is an official Dukies.com estimate.  And so, since there is only so much room in Jimmy’s head for disparate ideas, you can count on hearing about this again and again and again and again as the season unfolds.  Migraine medicine, please?  At least Dykes’ stupid, grating accent reminded me of one funny: whenever he prefaces some rote observation about a player and tries to say “Seeing him in practice,” he spurts out what very clearly sounds like “semen in practice.”  Giggle. 

I like Mike Gleason, and generally think he should get more assignments, but he was pretty bad too.  At the 6:36 mark of the second half, following an Andre Dawkins foul, for some reason Coastal got four free throws.  I have no idea why, and it took a big conference by the officials to dope it all out, complete with explanations to the coaches.  One of the things that I like about Al Michaels, to take one example, is that even in the midst of lopsided games, he remembers what he’s being primarily compensated to do, and lets the viewers know what appears to be going on during muddled situations.  Gleason and Dislykes, by contrast, kept shouting at full volume about the top ten teams in the Teenage Sons of the Athletic Directors’ Poll and fellating Rrhoy while all of this was in progress, so I never did figure out what actually transpired.  Gleason also failed to indicate why the officials called a turnover in several situations where the camera didn’t make it obvious, and tweeted Singler for a charge early when Lindsay had painstakingly indicated that Kyle had stepped on the baseline, something quite easy to see at game speed.  Whatever; at least Gleason went back and corrected himself, something that the infallible Brad Nessler never bothers to do.          

BOTTOM LINE:  I thought this was a pretty impressive win, particularly the last 25 minutes.  I give credit to Cliff Ellis, who always has been a crafty operational coach - - he had his team ready and quite well-prepared, and it took a few adjustments before Duke got comfortable.  A 25-point margin in a reduced-possession game is more than ample, though. 

TEN WORDS:  The Duke’s Tale features inside power and scoring - - neat twist. 

ON DECK:  Oh!  I guess I can just make a new paragraph. 

It’s been a long time since Duke played the Charlotte branch of the University of North Carolina, which, like many other state schools featuring the name of a city (Memphis, e.g.) just wants to be known as “Charlotte” now.  This is fine with me, since that’s what I’ve been calling the NFL Panthers since they debuted.  Anyway, it perplexes me that Duke and Charlotte have played only twice in their history, with Duke winning both games, in Cameron, in high-energy shootouts with Neeba-like scores, 111-94 and 104-82.  I remember the two games clearly because I was in Cameron for both; the games occurred in December of the 1990-1991 season and January of the 1991-1992 campaign.  So if you’re looking for a good omen, here you go: when Duke plays Charlotte in Cameron, Duke later wins the national title.  Alert Jimmy Dykes.      

It hit me last week that Duke and Davidson dropped each other from the schedule this season, which is okay by me since it seemed to be an excuse to visit Bobcats Arena every other year.  Now, maybe K should arrange a perpetual home-and-home with Charlotte instead - - with the road games for Duke to be played at Halton Arena - - but that will never happen.  Unless K continues to show that he’s a changed man . . . talking about the mere concept of shirting Czyz, playing zone . . . well, I can dream. 

Last season, Duke played Atlantic 10 member Rhode Island in Cameron early and went right down to the wire - - do we look for a repeat here?  I doubt it, if for no other reason than no one sent helpful tapes of Duke’s offense and J.J. Redick highlight films to Jimmy Baron and his dad this time.  Geez. 

The 49ers continue to be coached by Bobby Lutz, as highly-compensated private detectives/ninjas have been unable to locate and secure the fully nude pictures that Lutz possesses of all pertinent decisionmakers in the school’s administration.  Instead, Lootz returns for his 12th season despite going 5-11 in the A-14 a year ago and rather cleanly missing the .500 mark with an 11-20 record.  The Niners suffered a raft of injuries, but as far as I can tell Lutz has been coasting on fumes for years. 

He does seem to have addressed, or at least tried to address, one of his team’s major problems from 2008-2009 - - Charlotte was a dismal numero 274 in Division I in boarding margin.  In response, Lutz signed a pair of post-dwelling freshmen, 6-7, 225-pound K.J. Sherrill and 6-8, 235-pound Chris Braswell.  However, the two combined for just 25 minutes in the Niners’ opener against Elon, scoring only six points between them - - although the eight total boards wasn’t a shabby achievement.  Tootz also brought in 6-6, 235-pound junior transfer Shamari Spears, whom we all remember well from his time as an interchangeable frontcourt thug in Al “The Nutcracker” Skinner’s felonious BC attack.  Spears unsurprisingly jumped right into the Niners’ starting lineup against Nprth Carolina-Asheville and the Eloids, and scored a point a minute versus the latter, finishing with 23 on 10-17 shooting, all twos, and three foul shots in four tries.  Spears shot 55.4% as a Boston College freshman and had a showy 1.58 PPS before regressing to 1.29 in increased minutes as a sophomore, after which he cleared town pursued by an army of chomping, angry walnut-openers.  I always thought Spears was fairly consistent when he was on the floor, but he seemed to have stamina issues, and sure enough, he was frequently relieved in the frontcourt on Monday night despite being on fire from the floor.  Hmmm.  Zutz also started 6-10, 260-pound senior Phil Jones (7.3 ppg, 4.2 rpg last season), but Jones, despite a nice shotblocking technique, doesn’t position himself well for rebounds and also can’t stay on the floor for extended periods; he played 24 against Elon.  In the backcourt, there’s a three-guard attack led by truly gifted playmaker DiJuan Harris, a 5-9 senior who finished fourth in Division I with 7.2 apg a year ago and also contributed nine points an outing.  He’s joined by 6-5 senior RaShad Coleman (8.0 ppg, 3.1 rpg) and 6-2 sophomore Derrio Green, who joined the team as a newcomer in the spring after serving a one-year sentence at Gulf Coast (FL) CC.  The idea behind signing Green was to provide a backup for Harris, who set a Charlotte record for mpg last year, but Green logged 23 ticks against the Phoenix for some reason, while touted 6-3 redshirt freshman Shamarr Bowden was confined to lobbing six bombs from distance in nine minutes, hitting only one.  Depth comes from 6-5 junior Charles Dewhurst (4.0 ppg) and 6-4 senior Ian Andersen (9.7 ppg), who powered Charlotte’s offense last season with 81 threes, but was often inconsistent, and received just twelve minutes on Monday night.  By the way, Charlotte is missing a solid contributor at small forward, the intriguingly named An'Juan Wilderness; he is reputedly out with a calf injury.                     

Lutz can be wildly up and down as a coach, but he often puts together a pretty good game plan, and it wouldn’t stun me to see the 49ers come out hot, even if they were merely whelming against Elon.  Scoring in bunches is not one of their traits - - the team barely cleared 30% last season on triples, and shot an unimpressive 41.0% from the floor overall, to go along with a 68.2% free-throw mark.  Again Elon, the 49ers managed a line of .418/.591/.273, and they didn’t exactly wipe the Windex, getting outboarded by Elon.  Harris almost never turns the ball over and understands how to get the ball inside, so that’s a major strength against anyone, but one wonders how he will handle what will probably be a mix of much taller defenders (Scheyer has eight inches on him, and I don’t mean that to sound offensive) and some quickness from the returning Nolan Smith and Dawkins.  Meanwhile, if Spears gets motivated to hood it up against some old ACC pals, and Cole, Braswell and Sherrill come alive inside, this could get interesting. 

I haven’t read any other previews of this game, but I have a feeling that the leading meme will involve a “test” for the Blue Devils against the “athleticism” of the Niners.  However, Charlotte doesn’t excel at dribble-drive penetration, they’re still struggling on the boards (which is not good news against a HUUUUUUGE Duke squad), and they have no reliable three-point presence or steadying hand at the line to put together (or counter) any scoring runs. 

I certainly think that Charlotte is a better second-round opponent than most of the "name" participants in the early-season tourneys have faced so far (see, e.g., NCCU - - are you kidding me?  Meanwhile, Syracuse got Bob Morris and U-Con, Hofstra), and for that reason, this is a good chance for Duke, reintegrating Nolan into the lineup, to show its stuff.  I don’t think the Charlotte frontcourt will have the answer for Singler or any of the trees inside, and if the Blue Devils can hit some three-point shots, this one could get ugly for Lutz.  Otherwise, it’s probably going to a closer Duke win, but still a win. 

Duke 84, Charlotte 71. 

 

Wow, what is going on? Is Duke in some kind of tournament or something? Apparently so, the J.R.’s Lawn and Tree Service NIT Season Tip-Off, which is an odd name considering regular season play started a week before the first game of this event. But, nonetheless, Duke’s in it, and won their first game, a not-to-terribly-pretty-to-watch-but-highly-satisfying-final-score victory over Coastal Carolina. Head Coach Cliff Ellis, the recipient of numerous losses in Cameron, had his team perfectly prepared in the way only he can.

Speaking of watching the game, well, lo and behold, this one was actually on television for most of us. Unfortunately, the remote for my DVR went on the fritz (strangely it still runs the T.V. set, just not the DVR box). Most of what your remote does you can do using the buttons on the set-top box except for … pausing, rewinding and skipping commercials, only my three favorite features. My usual game strategy is to pause it when the broadcast starts and then go do something else for 10 minutes or so, allowing me ample opportunities to engage in time travel whenever there is a timeout. Even without that move, being able to create your own instant replays when ESPN doesn’t bother with them in favor of shots of the mascot is quite useful. This also can be employed to figure out what just happened on the floor while the announcers are talking about how UNC-CH, which was not playing in this game, is not only going the repeat as champions, but will do so with an undefeated season and average wining margins of 78 points per game.

But, hey, it certainly beats the Internet watching experience, so until my provider sends me that new remote, I’ll have to revert to old-school game watching. Duke’s next opponent is still playing as I write this, with an estimated completion time of 11:30 EST, so analysis of that team (probably Charlotte) is going to be a bit skimpy. Sigh, if only I had a partner on the West Coast who could help out.

It’s possible only four readers will get that reference, which just happens to be the exact number of Blue Devils who scored in double figures against Coastal Carolina, with another (Thomas) missing that distinction by a single point.  One interesting development is Andre Dawkins (I know I’ll call him Andre Buckner at least once this season) being allowed to gun away at will without Coach K getting out his vaudeville cane and yanking him off the stage, despite a first-half stretch where he seemed to take and miss the calling-card shot on four straight possessions. After a first half that had Duke officials calling for stimulus package funds to replace rims and stanchions all around the triangle area, Dawkins settled in and showed some impressive moves to and around the basket. It’s a good thing over the summer he figured out “all on his own” he could show up on campus a year early.

This is actually a big deal, as it seems K has backed off his “one bad shot or missed defensive assignment and you’re out of there” stance. But not 100 percent. After some early second half miscues, Olek Czyz sat for an extended period. Same with Plumlee 1.0. However, he ended with 10 points and Oleg pulled down five faulty shots in only 13 minutes of play. With the return of Nolan Smith tonight, it will be interesting to see what happens to Czyz’s minutes. I, for one, hope he still gets plenty of air time, as his defense and rebounding are superb.

Singler, of course, had a nice game, making more than half his shots en route to a 23-point 11-rebound report card. But did he really need to play 36 minutes in a game Duke won by 25 points? Which leads me to this story from Fox Sport’s Jeff Goodman. It’s kind of a jumbled affair, regarding Harrison Barnes’ decision and how it could hurt Duke if Singler jumps to the W-2 version of the game. But here’s the relevant, and odd, portion:

“Unless Kyle Singler returns for his senior season next year, which he hasn't ruled out, it's difficult to imagine the Blue Devils cutting down the nets anytime soon. ‘Our goal is for Kyle not to come back next year,’ Krzyzewski told me earlier in the week.”

What on earth does that mean? Is he saying Singler is a poisonous presence who needs to be swept out the door McRoberts-style? Certainly not, but you could read it that way. That the program’s goal is for him to have such a monster year that he’ll be a high lottery pick? That they hope he’ll lead the team to a championship and pick up player-of-the-year honors? If that’s what he meant, he certainly didn’t say it. Seriously, folks, chime up in the comments section and let me know how you interpret this.

Alrighty, back to Coastal Carolina and our winners and losers, otherwise known as:

WIN OF THE GAME: The defense. Coastal Carolina only made sixteen shots all night, and six of those were the kind where you have to dial a “1” first. That’s right, only 20 points inside, and 28.6 percent shooting overall. And, as Jimmy Dykes pointed out (more on him in a minute), often the defense is a man-to-man in a zone’s clothing. A really cool development.

FAIL OF THE GAME: Bill Belichick deciding to go for it on fourth and two inside his own 30 yard line with a six point lead, 2:08 left in the game and some dude named Peyton Manning on the other sideline. Oh, okay, that’s cheating. It’s supposed to be about the Duke game.

Then it would have to be the announcers. Jimmy Dykes can be hard to listen to, as his pre-game routine apparently involves about 20 Red Bulls, and he peppers his commentary with more jargon than your run-of-the-mill job ad written by an HR consultant (exactly what the hell is a “headhunter screen”?). And his tortured explanation of the new charge/block rule was certainly sponsored by the manufacturer of a migraine treatment. But at least he tries. Insipid Mike Gleason, on the other hand, clearly had better things to do than actually call the game in front of him. Just pick a couple of silly cliché’s and use them over and over. “Traveling music for Dawkins.” “Traveling music for Thomas.” Please. The only traveling music we need is for you to depart for your next broadcast and hopefully never darken my television set again. As for the temptation to discuss the unstoppable force down 15-501 that had trouble beating Valpo, could you at least contain it to timeouts where you didn’t go to a commercial, rather than prattling on while the game is in progress, players are scoring, fouls are being committed and substitutions are being made.  There was some kind of incident where the officials awarded Coastal Carolina an extra free-throw and this moron was talking about how Huckleberry Coach’s walk-ons are the best in the history of the game.

Have I killed enough time for Duke’s next opponent to make themselves known? Indeed. Have I taken enough time on the previous verbiage to not be able to fully analyze the contest? Yesssseriiiiie! It will be the UNC-Charlotte 49s, led last night by Shamari Spears’ 23 points, and playing a full 12 players in a game that was never a blowout. And only one of them didn’t get into the scoring column. Interesting. The team is deep, and features more size than Duke has seen this year, but this also marks Smith putting his impact on a game for the first time this year, which should really speed things up.

Duke 82, North Carolina-Charlotte 70.

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