Jan. 31 was a special day for this Duke team.
The Blue Devils won at previously unbeaten Virginia in dramatic fashion, making their prospects of contending for ACC and national titles down the road much more realistic than they had been just days prior, when Duke found itself 4-3 in ACC play and dismissed Rasheed Sulaimon.
But perhaps more important than the mere fact that the Blue Devils won was the way they won, with four perimeter players surrounding ACC Player of the Year Jahlil Okafor and one in particular—Justise Winslow—breaking out in a big way.
Quinn Cook and Tyus Jones were the ones who made the iconic 3-pointers that clinched the game for Duke, but it Winslow who kept the Blue Devils afloat in the opening period, scoring 11 of his team’s 26 points and sparking Duke’s 10-0 edge in fastbreak points. It was in this game that the Houston native started showing his knack for going coast-to-coast like few in the country can.
To put his performance in perspective, no team has been able to do what Winslow did almost single-handedly against the Cavaliers that day in a half—put up 10 or more fastbreak points in the course of a 40-minute game.
“When I’m aggressive, it opens up a lot of things for my teammates and myself,” Winslow said before the Blue Devils took on Syracuse Feb. 28. “I just try to stay aggressive and try to get in the paint and play physical, because that really will open up a lot of things for our shooters and for Jah.”
Following the 6-foot-6, 225-pound forward’s first career double-double against Virginia, his game took off—and so did his team’s. After a rough six-game stretch in January that saw Duke’s only three regular season losses in which Winslow battled shoulder and rib injuries and averaged just 5.8 points and 3.0 rebounds per game, the former McDonald’s All-American looked like a new man and averaged 15.3 points and 8.9 rebounds per game in his next eight.
This stretch saw eight Blue Devil wins and three more Winslow double-doubles as the freshman stepped up in crunch time as a matchup nightmare playing the four. In the eight-game span’s final contest—a 91-86 overtime win at Virginia Tech Feb. 25—Okafor carried Duke for much of the game, but it was Winslow’s seven-point, four-rebound effort in the extra session that made the difference.
He also sparked the Blue Devils’ second-half comeback with a few game-changing, coast-to-coast drives that seem to give his team a new energy level in transition.
“The kid who turned the game around was Justise,” head coach Mike Krzyzewski said after the game. “All of a sudden we were eight points down and everything was going in their direction. Justise just took the ball down the court a couple times. He just gave us a verve.”
Winslow has scored in double figures in Duke’s last 14 games. Despite concerns about how the explosive forward could match up defensively with opposing big men when the Blue Devils surround Okafor with Winslow and three other perimeter players, the swingman has been able to hold his own when he can avoid foul trouble.
But one Blue Devil who has seen a drastic reduction in production with the swingman’s ascent is junior captain Amile Jefferson. The power forward has played more than 23 minutes only in the two North Carolina games this year since Winslow’s late-season charge, scoring in double figures just once and failing to record more than six rebounds in any game.
If Jefferson can find a way to break out of his slump at the perfect time, Duke could get even more versatility at the perfect time and get back to playing more minutes with two true big men, which would make Winslow even more dangerous for teams that couldn’t game-plan for him playing the four.
“Amile hasn’t been playing as well. We need to get him back up to playing like when he was starting early,” Krzyzewski said before the team’s regular season finale at North Carolina March 7. “One of the main things that Amile needs to be able to do is rebound. You’re not being guarded, so you have a chance to get runs to the rim and be an amazing screener and to take pride on that.”
But even if Jefferson continues to take a backseat in the Big Dance, expect Winslow’s play to be a barometer of how well the Blue Devils fare. Although his team is coming off its first loss since Jan. 28 and the start of Winslow’s breakout stretch, the top-10 NBA prospect was a big reason Duke cut a 15-point halftime deficit to four and got back in the game in the semifinals of the ACC tournament. Winslow poured in all 11 of his points and seven rebounds in the second half to put his team in position to win and give Okafor much-needed support on the offensive end.
And after starting the game slowly like the rest of his teammates, it became clear that the swingman is as important as any of his teammates to Duke’s NCAA tournament prospects—not just because of his production, but because of his emotion and energy.
“In the second half, individually my play picked up, but I can’t let my teammates down in that way [early on],” Winslow said after the game.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.