While Luol Deng and Chris Duhon are out of town with the Bulls, the Blue Devils will replace their former teammates at Chicago’s United Center Saturday against Valparaiso.
Even without the support of Deng and Duhon, the atmosphere will be comfortable for the Blue Devils, as it is a homecoming for junior Sean Dockery and head coach Mike Krzyzewski. The pair returns to a city with an extensive basketball history and distinct street style of play.
“There is inner city Chicago, and there are the suburbs. In the city, it’s a lot of fast-paced games, a lot of running, pressing. I hate to generalize, but the exchanges are not too long, so you wouldn’t need a shot clock. Sean has had to change his game to play at this level,” Krzyzewski said. “He is changing, and sometimes when you change, you find a strength that you never knew you had.”
On the Chicago streets, Dockery learned to be a hard-nose on-the-ball defender, but lacked some tools to be a point guard when he arrived at Duke. With Duhon on the Bulls and Duke trying to solidify a replacement, Dockery returns to a familiar turf.
Though the closer team geographically, Indiana’s Valparaiso (0-3) will certainly not be the comfortable one this Saturday afternoon in Chicago. Ninth-ranked Duke (4-0), led by J.J. Redick and Daniel Ewing, is coming off a high-intensity win over Michigan State.
Despite a winless record so far, the Crusaders are not a lifeless team and have several individual scoring options.
Junior Dan Oppland leads the Valparaiso attack in minutes and averages 11.7 points per game. Additionally, Ron Howard and Jimmie Miles contribute more than 12 points per game, and each of the three has stepped up in games this season.
As a team, however, the Crusaders are shooting only 39 percent from the field. This weakness will likely play to the Blue Devils’ advantage. Duke’s strong defense has held opponents below their average shooting percentages this season, as it did to Valparaiso in last year’s 97-63 victory at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
After facing a larger Michigan State team, which controlled the paint, Duke and its big man duo of Shavlik Randolph and Shelden Williams will look to make an early impact under the basket.
“We have two of the most talented big guys in the country, and we’re starting to develop really good role players,” Redick said. “So on a night where Daniel and I don’t combine for 60 points, I still think we can get the job done.”
Valparaiso’s lineup is also larger than Duke’s, with each starter several inches taller than his Blue Devil counterpart.
The most notable force is 6-foot-10, 310-pound center Kenny Harris, who could lure Duke’s big men into foul trouble, decreasing their defensive aggressiveness.
“Throughout the year we need him to play a lot of minutes, and the less fouls he has, the more minutes he will play,” Krzyzewski said of Williams. “He’s in shape to play a full game, and he can play 40 minutes, that’s what we have our guys trained to do. Part of it is playing well, part is staying out of foul trouble and being smart.”
While the Blue Devils have several days to prepare for the contest, the team will use its time to recover from a physically taxing stretch of three games in eight days.
“We’ve been trying to get our bodies back,” Randolph said after the exhausting win over Michigan State.
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