C oastal Carolina came out Thursday night and quickly made it clear that this was going to be a physical game for Duke.
In the first few minutes, the Chanticleers hammered Duke inside, and that continued for the whole game. Several players were in situations that could have resulted in injury. John Blackwell was thrown to the ground and grimaced in immediate pain. It looked much more serious than it was, fortunately. Ngongba got pushed backwards and hit the floor hard enough to make a noise that was heard throughout Cameron. Sebastian Wilkins got poked in the eye, which could have been quite serious. There was more, too.
All it really seemed to do in the end, though, was to piss Duke off. After adjusting to what Coastal was trying to do, Duke shot out to a 16-0 lead, en route to a 113-52 win. The 61-point margin was the biggest of Jon Scheyer's career.
Pat Ngongba was particularly dominant, with a career-best 28 points. In fact, Duke and Ngongba were so dominant that he was personally outscoring Coastal Carolina until Trey Perry got the Chanticleers to 29 points with 11:33 to play.
Duke's offense was really impressive, and offense always gets the most attention, but the defense was tremendous.
Coastal only shot 4-22 from deep (18 percent), and 19-63 (30 percent) overall, and a fair amount of that came after Duke eased up late. Coastal was outrebounded 53-27, and had 15 turnovers.
Of those rebounds by Duke, 39 were defensive. Toss in the 17 turnovers, and that's 56 potential shots Duke denied Coastal. Toss in 9 blocks, and that's 65.
The pressure was overwhelming, but it wasn't just coming from defense.
Duke's offense put a lot of pressure on the Chanticleers as well.
Ngongba shot 10-13/2-3, and that, alone, was almost impossible to overcome. He also had 9 rebounds. John Blackwell had 15, Dame Sarr had 12, Cayden Boozer 11, and JoJo Boumtje Boumtje had 9.
Duke assisted on 25 of 38 shots, which works out to nearly 66 percent.
And this is something truly impressive: Boozer had 12 assists to 1 turnover.
The Blue Devils got 38 points from the bench, including 15 from Caleb Foster in just 17 minutes. Bryson Howard and Deron Rippey scored 8 each, including two breathtaking drives by Rippey. Cameron Williams got his first three-pointer, while Sebastian Wilkins scored 4, and also pulled down 11 rebounds to lead Duke in that category.
Look at it this way: Ngongba, Boozer, and Wilkins each set a personal best in scoring, assists, and rebounds respectively, and Foster shot 5-7 off the bench.
Consider this too: playing Coastal Carolina will probably serve them well as a warm-up for an always-physical Michigan State. Duke will see them Tuesday in Chicago.
Notes – Drew Scharnowski sat this one out as part of his rehab/load management….as one sign of Coastal's aggressive approach, Foster got ejected after drawing two technicals…Coastal's Derrick Green, massive at 6-9 and 275, played 10 minutes, getting 1 rebound, 1 steal, and 4 fouls…Ngongba will get all the attention, but Boozer was brilliant…his passing was superb…in the second half, Duke seemed determined to get Blackwell going….it worked…Maxime Meyer got 5 minutes, and managed 3 rebounds, 1 block, and one absolutely beautiful pass…As big as Duke's win was, it could have been worse…the Blue Devils left 15 points on the line, only shooting 26-41 there for 63%…
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