How Duke survived so many weird things to, as usual, beat BC basketball at Cameron
In the strangest of basketball seasons, Wednesday night’s game between Duke and Boston College delved even deeper into oddities before the Blue Devils escaped with an 83-82 win.
Already playing in a Cameron Indoor Stadium devoid of spectators due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Duke Blue Devils were playing just their second game in 29 days due to having games wiped out by the public health emergency.
Toss that on top of the strange sight of Mike Krzyzewski’s absence from Duke’s bench as the 73-year-old Hall of Fame coach is quarantining due to close contact with a family member who tested positive for COVID-19.
And the game was being played 250 miles south of Washington, D.C., where, earlier
Wednesday, the U.S. Capitol was breached via an insurrection for the first time since 1814.
Then Boston College, having lost seven of its nine games this season and all three of its ACC games so far, went out and built a 16-point lead over the Blue Devils with 2:13 to play in the first half.
At that point, Duke provided some semblance of normalcy.
The Blue Devils defended with vengeance, getting arms and hands in passing lanes to deflect passes, force turnovers and get easy baskets.
Jon Scheyer relieved with the win
Wendell Moore, admittedly in the worst scoring slump of his career, started hitting shot after shot after shot. And he had help with four other Blue Devils reaching double figures in scoring.
Boston College’s 16-point lead shrunk to eight at halftime. It disappeared completely less than three minutes into the second half.
Then Duke, as it routinely does, made big plays in the game’s final minutes.
Moore’s contested jumper, as the shot clock expired, with 44 seconds left gave Duke a 3-point lead. His free throw with 11 seconds left gave Duke its largest lead of the game at four points.
The Blue Devils walked off the court with a one-point win, just their fourth win of the season even though this is the first week of January.
Tasked with filling in for Krzyzewski as Duke’s acting head coach, Jon Scheyer could smile and joke in his post-game media session on Zoom.
“It’s easier to call Coach after the game,” Scheyer said with a heavy dose of relief.
Wendell Moore finds his stroke
Speaking of relief, Moore received a large dose, too.
He’d missed 20 of his last 21 shots to find himself a reserve after starting the season in the starting lineup. He began to find his stroke again playing pick-up basketball at a local high school gym while home in Charlotte for a quick holiday break last month.
His first 3-pointer banked in on Wednesday night. Sure it was unsightly but that was good enough all things considered.
“For me, I was just happy to see it go through,” Moore said. “Just seeing that first one go through, I feel like it took everything that was on my shoulders off of me and allowed me to play free and just go out there and win the game.”
He tallied a career-high 25 points by hitting 8 of 13 shots overall, including seven of eight free throws. He made Duke, as Scheyer said, a different team.
“I think his versatility is something we’ve missed,” Scheyer said. “He’s a guy who really defended every position tonight. We had him flashing in the middle of the zone. We had him driving the ball from the perimeter. Obviously, he got to the free-throw line. He’s defending down on the block and guarding outside.”
Duke hot on defense
Oh and let’s talk about Duke’s defense. The Blue Devils recorded 14 steals, the most they’d secured in an ACC regular-season game in seven years.
Moore, DJ Steward, Jeremy Roach and Jordan Goldwire had three each.
Boston College shot 56.1%, an impressive number fueled by its white-hot start. The Eagles shot 69.2% in the first half while building that 16-point lead.
Their shooting dropped to 45.2% in the second half as Duke did a better job of keeping Boston College ball handlers out of the lane and away from the rim.
“We knew we had to get stops and the stops were going to lead to buckets,” Steward said.
Duke did that and won a game it looked for the longest time like it wouldn’t. It kept the Blue Devils unbeaten in 12 games against Boston College at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
An odd occurrence was averted, a downright weird thing these days, all things considered.
This story was originally published January 7, 2021 at 6:30 AM with the headline "How Duke survived so many weird things to, as usual, beat BC basketball at Cameron."