Duke men impressive in blow-out win over James Madison

Houston awaits

“Jared’s winning. Jared’s winning.”

Okay, the Duke-James Madison NCAA Tournament Round of 32 game wasn’t played in Cameron. Maybe somebody chanted that during Duke’s 93-55 win Sunday evening.

But there was a point late in the first half when Duke’s sharp-shooting freshman Jared McCain had 19 points, while JMU had 17. It was 36-17 at that point.

We’ve heard a lot this week about the James Madison Dukes and their long winning streak and their trendy Cinderella status. They sure looked the part in a wire-to-wire win over Wisconsin Friday. When their coach Mark Byington was asked about Duke’s tradition he defiantly answered that his team wasn’t playing Duke’s tradition, it was playing this Duke team.

Which was the right answer. They put their pants on one leg at a time like us and all that.

But when they squared off against this Duke team it wasn’t close.  

It took McCain all of 16 seconds to put Duke up 3-0. JMU scored to make it 3-2 then Jeremy Roach and Kyle Filipowski and Tyrese Proctor had two-pointers and JMU’s best player, Terrence Edwards, Jr, was on the bench with two fouls and another McCain triple made it 12-4 and another made it 15-5 and the clock was striking midnight and the coachmen were turning back into mice and well, that’s as far as I want to take this particular analogy.

“I don't know if we expected this,” Jon Scheyer acknowledged, “but I just thought our guys came out with such a great competitiveness and they were obviously ready to play. Not just ready to play. You have to be ready to compete in these games, and everybody that was on the floor I felt had that.”

McCain certainly was ready.

“I feel like every game, I'm always ready to see if I'm going to go off. it's the best feeling in the world when you know the work that you put in is showing up on the court, especially in such a big game like this, to go to the Sweet 16. For these types of games, you just want to win and I want to do everything I can to win, and tonight if it's making shots, making 3s, whatever it was.”

Filipowski said Duke’s defense enabled them to put away James Madison early.

“Watching the game against Wisconsin, they had 14 of their first 17 points off of turnovers and in transition, so just not letting them get in the flow early on in the game. Just we won that game a lot with our defense, and I know we had guys that were on fire tonight, too. But you know, that just came with our defense. It was great,”

This was the Duke team we thought we would see last fall, stifling on defense, the ball never sticking on offense, 3-pointers raining down, a miserly six turnovers, a killer instinct that never gave James Madison even the silliest centimeter of hope. The word “clinic” occurred to me. So did “foot on the throat.”

There was one scary moment early on when Roach appeared to dislocate a finger. But he got it taped, took a deep breath, hit reset and went back to work.

Scheyer said Duke would evaluate further when the team got back to Durham.

And a scary moment in the second half when Jaylen Blakes went down hard on a foul.

But he took a seat on the bench after being evaluated for a concussion. Again, further testing awaits. Fingers crossed. It’s not like Duke has a lot of guards to spare.

It was 47-25 at the half. Duke’s lead never got below 20 in the second half, then hit 30 and they finished it out because college basketball doesn’t have a mercy rule.

McCain ended with 30 points, 8 for 11 from beyond the arc. Joining him in double figures were Proctor (18 points), Roach (15) and Filipowski (14).

Edwards led JMU with 13. That’s right. Duke had four players score more points than JMU’s leading scorer, while holding the Dukes to 29 points below their season average.

On to Dallas, late game Friday, top-ranked Houston or Texas A&M await, two Texas teams in the state of Texas.

But for now, lots to feel good about.

“Obviously we are going to enjoy this one,” Scheyer said, “celebrate it today, and find out quickly who we are playing and can't wait to go to Dallas.”