Cooper Flagg leads Duke to big win over Pitt.

Shut-down defense in 76-47 win.

If you’re not careful Duke’s defense will take your lunch money, kick sand in your face and diss your mama.

Maybe even if you are careful.

Don’t believe me? Listen to Pitt coach Jeff Capel, whose Panthers came in Cameron 12-2 and a top-20 team in the nerd polls but came out on the short end of a 76-47 beat-down Tuesday night in Cameron.

“Their size, their ability to switch in the gaps. We didn’t play our best. A big part of that was them. Their length and their size plays into it. Their ability to switch everything took us out of some things. Our decision making wasn’t great. It’s tough to score at the rim on those guys.”

The stats back up Capel’s gloomy post-mortem. Pitt shot 31% from the field, 30% from beyond the arc. Their two best players, Ishmael Leggett (2-15) and Jaland Lowe (3-12) combined for 5 for 27. Both are around 6-3 and just got swallowed up by Duke’s defense.

This gave Pitt a lot of chances to corral offensive rebounds.

They grabbed nine. Duke pulled down 32 defensive rebounds on the way to a 41-26 advantage.

“They missed a lot of shots.” Jon Scheyer noted. “It’s important for us to rebound them. Offensive rebounding was equal. But I thought we forced more missed shots and we got them. That’s got to be a key. I thought we did a great job collectively of getting in there and getting them.”

Pitt also turned it over 11 times.

As impressive as Duke’s defense was, that’s not what we’re going to be talking about down the road.

Some context. Early in the second half Pitt threw the ball out of bounds. The officials gave them the ball to the consternation of the Duke players, staff and fan base.

In fairness, they probably thought Maliq Brown knocked it out. Because deflecting passes and dribbles is what he does.

Now Brown wasn’t actually playing at the time. He was 70 or so feet away.

So, there’s that.

Cooper Flagg was close to the play and the missed call got his lather up.

He immediately picked up his third foul.

A few seconds later he picked off a Lowe pass and took off down the court. He attacked the basket like Dick Butkus used to attack ball carriers.

Pitt’s Guillermo Diaz Graham tried to defend.

Now, Diaz Graham is a seven-footer but he never had a chance.

That’s one way to get on Sports Center.

I assume you’ve either seen the dunk live, on TV or on social media. If you’ve been hiding under a rock, it’s easy to find.

When Sion James was asked about the dunk in the locker room, he smiled and said “Coop’s incredible.”

Copy that.

Flagg dunked on Duke’s next possession and nobody got in his way.

Flagg said he would need to see the dunk from more angles to say if it was his best in-game dunk. But definitely top three.

Duke jumped on top early, 3-pointers by Tyrese Proctor, Sion James and Flagg helping put Duke up 11-5.

Pitt used a 7-0 run to take their first lead, 12-11.

Their last lead was 14-13.

Mason Gillis got five points for Duke, Khaman Maluach scored off an offensive rebound and Kon Knueppel hit a triple.

It was 23-14.

Gillis was in because Flagg was on the bench with two fouls.

Flagg came back in but scored only five points in the first half. He admitted he was overly cautious in attempting to avoid that third foul.

“I was kind of floating a little bit. I wasn’t creating any advantages for my teammates. I knew going into the second half that I needed create advantages for my teammates, which kind of opened it up for me a little bit.”

The half ended with Duke up 34-24. Knuppel had 11 points, 3 for 5 from beyond the arc.

Flagg came out determined to dominate the second half. He scored inside 11 seconds into the half. A couple of defensive rebounds, a block and then dunk city.

The first dunk and subsequent foul shot put Duke up 40-26, the second dunk 42-28.

Give Pitt credit. Capel said his team finally found some rhythm offensively. Lowe hit a 3 to make it 53-43, with 15 minutes left. Duke surged back up 50-33, Knueppel with five points, Flagg a put-back.

Pitt again made another run. It was 58-47 when Scheyer called timeout with just under eightr minutes left. Sion James turned it over and Pitt had a chance to get the deficit into single digits.

They did not. Capel said the game got away from his team and that’s an understatement.

I’d like to know what Scheyer told his team during that timeout. When asked, he deflected.

“It’s a secret. I’m never going to tell you. I said something amazing. No, it was all our guys. We had a good flow going. I didn’t sub as much. I wanted to sub and get those guys in. but the game kind of got away from us, where time just goes. I just wanted us to regroup. I never felt comfortable in the game because they can score so quick.”

Scheyer kept his starters in until Isaiah Evans replaced Flagg with 30 seconds left. Duke didn’t get a single point from its bench in the second half. Duke outscored Pitt 18-0 over that final almost eight-minute span.

Think about that. An ACC team averaging 84 points per game goes scoreless for the final 7:59 of the game.

Capel didn’t empty his bench either. For what that’s worth.

Maybe Scheyer mentioned Blake Hinson and protecting our house. Or maybe he just wanted to work on end-of-game-situtations.

Keep in mind that Proctor and Caleb Foster are the only Duke players returning from that game and Hinson is playing in Santa Cruz.

Proctor hasn’t forgotten.

“I think it was embarrassing. You never want to let a team come in here and jump on the table and disrespect us like that.”

Speaking of Proctor he was the receipient of a flagrant, below-the-belt cheap shot from Pitt’s Damian Dunn in the final minute.

Proctor said the two had not been talking trash to each other but noted that Dunn played on the Houston team that Duke defeated in last year’s Sweet Sixteen.

Proctor seemed fine after the game. Dunn was ejected. I’m sure the ACC will give him a stern talking to.

Knueppel ended with 17 points. Proctor had 13 points and four assists, James 10 points, seven rebounds, four assists and two blocks and Maluach 11 points and eight rebounds.

But, to borrow a phrase, Flagg is the straw that stirs Duke’s drink; 19 points, 11 rebounds, five assists.

Scheyer threw down a gauntlett.

“I know I’m biased but if we’re not talking about him as one of the best, with a chance to be the best player in the country. To me, he is the best player in the country. I think he’s proven that with who we’ve played, the competition, the fact that he’s done it in such a mature way. He doesn’t hunt numbers. He just puts up numbers as the game comes to him. I think we need to make sure we’re talking about him the right way. He’s proven it to me. For me, when we step on the floor, we have the best player in the country.”

Duke jumped to 5-0 ACC, 13-2 overall, nine straight wins and counting.