BROOKLYN, N.Y. — Jon Scheyer knows higher than most the pressure that comes with wearing a Duke uniform. The highs seem a little bit higher and the lights seem brighter than most.
“And when things aren’t going so well, you can feel like you’re a lot worse than you really are,” said the Duke head coach and former star guard. “When you lose in the ACC Tournament, we lose our last game of the regular season and it feels like the world is ending a little bit – even though all these guys came back for this and came back for this, this is the moment right here.”
Just per week ago, the Blue Devils were still reeling from a five-point loss at home to North Carolina in the regular-season finale and a subsequent five-point loss to NC State in the ACC Tournament. Center Kyle Filipowski said he and his teammates cannot and shouldn’t feel entitled to wins this time of 12 months simply because they’re Duke. They had to fight tooth and nail for it, similar to last 12 months once they lost to Tennessee in the second round of the NCAA tournament.
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And so there sit the same Blue Devils, the Sweet 16 tied after an emphatic 93-55 victory over No. 12 seed James Madison in Sunday’s South Region game at the Barclays Center. That’s why players like Filipowski and Tyrese Proctor returned to school. This feeling, straight away.
“This is what you dream about as a kid,” Proctor said.
Said Filipowski: “We learned our lesson last year. We didn’t want to repeat that.”
JARED McHIM 🕺🕺
🔥 30 burgers for 11 minutes
🔥 Most 1H points by any player in this tournament
🔥 Most 3 FGM points in the NCAA tournament by a Duke player (8) pic.twitter.com/azdmyZ9b0H
— Duke Men’s Basketball (@DukeMBB) March 24, 2024
So fourth-seeded Duke pounced on James Madison right out of the gate and nearly doubled the Dukes by halftime. Jared McCain became the first freshman to rating 30 points and 0 turnovers in an NCAA Tournament game since the field expanded to 64 players in 1985. He finished the game with a career-high eight three-pointers. After making only one shot against Vermont in the first round, Filipowski added 14 points, five rebounds, 4 assists, two steals and one block. As a team, it was as clean a game as might be hoped for in these conditions – the Blue Devils shot over 50 percent, assisted on 22 of 33 made baskets and turned the ball over just six times. in the game.
“I don’t know if we expected it,” Scheyer later admitted.
However, he knew his team could be higher than it was at the end of the regular season. Players and coaches alike often discuss how this game can humble you. This was achieved in losses to NC State and UNC (though, because it seems, each of those teams also got here out in the Sweet 16).
“The positive side of this (ACC Tournament loss) was that it gave us a week to work on ourselves and look in the mirror,” Scheyer said. (*16*)
This work included individual and team-wide conversations. Scheyer wanted to discover where his players were mentally before considering what went improper on the court during those two losses. The defense was pretty solid, but the offense hurt the defense. How could they improve their connectivity? Their ball movement? How could they learn from two tough losses but not let those two tough losses define them?
Scheyer said after the game that he thought Sunday was the Blue Devils’ best passing game of the season. Filipowski said Duke’s defense was the key to the game; JMU scored 14 of the first 17 points against Wisconsin on Friday outside of turnovers and in transition. The Blue Devils didn’t want the Dukes doing what they do best, so that they had to set the tone early and sometimes.
“I know we had guys that were on fire tonight,” Filipowski said.
No one knows what the future holds for this particular Duke team, but nobody saw this performance coming either. Now the Blue Devils will face Houston in Dallas next weekend in the Elite Eight. Yes, the lows were low, but that is in the past and the highs are on deck.
“You have to be grateful for the bad times that come your way,” Scheyer said. “If you handle them the right way, yow will discover yourself in a situation where you are much more ready. I assumed that was the case against Vermont and today against James Madison.
