The Duke men’s basketball team got the big non-conference win it needed Wednesday night in Madison Square Garden, pulling away from Baylor late for a 78-70 victory.
With Tyrese Proctor still out with a balky ankle--his return seems imminent--Jon Scheyer rode his starters for 179 of a possible 200 minutes and was rewarded with five double-figure performances and a late-game surge that belied even a hint of fatigue against a deeper Baylor team. But don’t discount some big moments in that span by Ryan Young in relief of Kyle Filipowski after Filipowski took a seat with four fouls.
Led by Jeremy Roach and Jared McCain Duke dominated early, leading by scores like 18-8, 20-10, 22-12 and 26-16.
But any thoughts that we might be seeing a repeat of Baylor’s big loss to Michigan State went bye-bye when Baylor big Yves Missi sparked a 12-0 run and it was on.
Duke took a tenuous 34-32 lead into intermission. Neither team led by more than a possession in the second half until 3-pointers by Jalen Bridges and Ja’Kobe Walker put Baylor up 48-42, with about 14 minutes left.
This is where the Duke team that we saw against Georgia Tech would have folded its tent and gone home.
But Duke has grown since then. Filipowski assisted a Mark Mitchell dunk, scored six points in a minute-and-a-half, assisted a McCain triple and the crisis was averted.
The teams traded baskets until around the six-minute mark. With the game tied at 61-61, Ryan Young scored inside off a nifty Roach assist and the Blue Devils were off to a decisive 9-0 run to go up 70-61 with 3:35 left.
Scheyer cited Young’s play down this stretch as crucial.
“It's an interesting time, {Filipowski] gets four fouls, and I'm usually pretty aggressive with keeping guys in with fouls. But you have a guy in Ryan who has been in these moments before, and he had the best sequence of the game. The finish, which I was told he got his 1,000th point off Jeremy's pass to him for the finish. The pass to Jared then for the three. And then the rebound and he makes two free throws. That's a big-time sequence. It really extended that lead and put us in a great position to win.”
The lead never again dropped below eight points.
McCain and Roach led Duke with 21 and 18 points respectively. Filipowski had 13 points, 10 rebounds, four assists and three steals, with Caleb Foster adding 12 points and Mitchell 10.
RayJ Dennis led Baylor with 17 points.
But a couple of other stat lines stand out. Duke had 14 assists and only eight turnovers, while forcing 14 Baylor turnovers.
“We were disruptive,” Scheyer said, praising his perimeter. “They [Baylor] had more turnovers than assists. And so, I think they've shown a lot of physical and mental toughness. Like I said, Jeremy, just being the vet and being in these situations, he never looks rattled. And then for Jared and Caleb, they never look rattled.”
And Baylor hit eight 3-pointers, one below their average coming into the game, good but not good enough to overcome the turnovers.
Best of all Duke closed strong. Roach said “we're down six and Kyle had the three free throws and he said ‘We get the lead, they'll get tight.’ And they got a little tight and we extended the lead.”
Scheyer gave credit to his team for working, growing and learning.
“For us to be in some big-time games right away, and we didn't play our best in a couple of those. We didn't finish in two of them. We have two wins right there and we didn't finish. But we went through some stuff together. Those games, I think, more got brought to the light. I give these guys credit for just putting their heads down and working. I thought we were incredibly tough tonight. I'm not saying Baylor wasn't. I thought we were more mentally tough down the stretch, which is what this program has been about.”
I didn't realize that Ryan Young got his 1000th point last night. Congrats big guy! Now get back in the podcast room over the holidays.