PHILADELPHIA - The scene was eerily reminiscent of last Sunday's Michigan game-a double-digit lead and 10 minutes to go in a contest against a top-10 team-except this game had a much different ending.
Thanks to a revived backcourt offense and better defensive pressure, the No. 14 Blue Devils (7-2, 1-0 in the Atlantic Coast Conference) were able to prevent a recurring nightmare of their 62-61 loss to the Wolverines as they held on to upset No. 4 Villanova (6-1, 2-0 in the Big East) 87-79 Saturday at the CoreStates Center.
"[In a huddle at the 9:54 mark] Coach mentioned that 'the basketball gods are doing this to us for a reason' because basically it was almost the same situation as Michigan, but we handled it a lot better," senior Jeff Capel said. "We learned from that failure and we went out today and got tougher in that situation."
The team spent the last week between the games working on situations such as what happened in the Michigan game, and the practice was well worth it.
"We believed in ourselves and I think we've improved over this last week," sophomore guard Trajan Langdon said. "We ended up pulling out the win because we played together. When you go through adversity, you're going to learn from it and I think we did in this week by preparing for situations like this."
A great deal of the credit for the win goes to the Duke backcourt of Capel, Langdon and junior Ricky Price. The trio scored 49 of the Blue Devils' points and hit a combined 7-for-12 from
"The play of our three perimeter guys-Trajan, Jeff and Ricky-gave us a lot of confidence," coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "They worked really hard to get open and they gave us a big boost."
The Duke backcourt has not been playing consistently this season, but their performance against the Wildcats proved that when all three are on, they are virtually unstoppable.
"[The Duke backcourt] certainly came out of their slump today," Villanova coach Steve Lappas said. "They had guys like Capel who were shooting 25 or 20 percent for the year. They made their shots today."
The first half of the game consisted of a series of runs traded between the two teams. With Villanova leading by four-the largest lead it would have for the game-the Blue Devils erupted on a 20-2 run to take the lead, 27-13. Villanova managed to claw their way back with a 10-0 run, but the Blue Devils then tamed the Wildcats by charging back with an 11-3 run. Duke ended the half with a seven-point advantage over Villanova.
"We came out very strong," Krzyzewski said. "I thought they played great for about four minutes there and they were fast-breaking us. We handled that, and I felt good about us going into the half with a three-possession lead."
Villanova kept Duke's lead within 10 for the first few minutes of the second half, but following a jumper by senior center Greg Newton at the 17:17 mark to put Duke up 48-37, the Wildcats remained in a double-digit debt to the Blue Devils for nearly 15 minutes. Villanova managed to narrow the gap in the last minutes of the game by committing eight fouls in the final 2:20 in an attempt to regain possession of the ball, but it was not enough.
"We totally got outplayed from the beginning of the game to the end, without question," Lappas said. "We had trouble getting into our offense through most of the game which had everything to do with their defensive pressure. They did a great job of pressuring our baskets."
Lappas also credited the Blue Devils with better shooting-better than his Wildcats had shot in any game yet this season. His statement is reassuring for the Blue Devils following several games of offensive frustration.
"We haven't been shooting well, and I think we haven't been shooting well because we haven't been working as hard to get the ball into good position to shoot," Krzyzewski said. "This whole week we've worked very hard, and after the game, the first people I congratulated were our walk-ons. They did a lot of extensive work this week with our perimeter so we could work on getting open, and I thought that was the key to the game."
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