The Duke team that defeated No. 2 Wisconsin 80-70 Wednesday night was not the Blue Devil basketball team we have become accustomed to through the season's first seven games.
In the first half, Amile Jefferson had zero rebounds. Tyus Jones had one assist. Justise Winslow failed to score and coughed up the ball three times. Quinn Cook and Jahlil Okafor were effective when they were on the court, but both picked up two quick fouls and didn't play their regular heavy allotment of minutes.
The defense was practically unrecognizable for the Blue Devils. The switching was constant, which led to Jones covering the likes of Frank Kaminsky and Sam Dekker, while Marshall Plumlee gave his patented frenetic effort in his futile attempts to stop Wisconsin's guards. Luckily for the visitors, the switching didn't hurt Duke, as it wasn't until 53 seconds remained in the game that Kaminsky finally got the ball to post up a Blue Devil point guard.
The offense as a whole also looked out of sorts. A team that has averaged more than 24 free throw attempts per game failed to get to the charity stripe even once in the first 20 minutes. Although Duke was getting easier looks than the Badgers, they certainly weren't taking easy shots. Time and again the Blue Devil guards would get into the paint only to take a tough, contested shot through Wisconsin's massive front line.
Through all of these struggles Duke had a few players who were able to keep the team afloat. Tyus Jones will be dubbed the hero for his play—and every bit of the credit attributed to him is deserved after he scored a career-high 22 points on 7-of-11 shooting, tied the team-high with six rebounds and led the team with four assists.
But the performances of Rasheed Sulaimon and Matt Jones cannot be understated.
The need for 'Sheed was apparent immediately after the 6-foot-5 guard stepped on the court, as he canned a 3-pointer coming off of a screen to respond to sophomore Bronson Koenig's triple. In addition to his tenacious defense, Sulaimon scored a season-high 14 points, grabbed three rebounds and doled out a pair of assists.
Fans know Sulaimon can be an electric scorer, but that simply hasn't been his game this season. Once a flashy scorer, as a junior, Sulaimon has become content to be an orchestrator instead of a finisher, distributing and setting up his teammates instead of lighting up the scoreboard himself.
But Wednesday night Sulaimon turned back the clock, showing a renewed fire and desire on the offensive end. He attacked the rim on one possesion, then stepped back and burned the defense from beyond the arc on the next. In short, he was a nightmare for anyone trying to contest him.
Then there was Matt Jones. The Desoto, Texas, native has been surprisingly potent as a scorer this year after struggling to make an impact in that department as a freshman. But tonight he was vintage Matt Jones—the gritty defender never afraid to sacrifice his body for the good of the team. He didn't make an impact from beyond the arc, though the team didn't shoot as freely as it usually does, so it's hard to blame his quiet offensive day.
Perhaps no play better encapsulate's Jones' impact Wednesday than the moment in the first half when he laid out for a loose ball, knocking it toward Winslow, who flung it ahead for a thunderous Plumlee dunk. The highlight reels will show Plumlee's big finish, but without Jones, that play never happens. The effort showed the sort of aggressiveness Jones played with all night, and that is the reason he consistently finds himself on the court with the game on the line.
The Duke team that came out of the locker room for the second half more closely resembled the team we are used to watching. Okafor scored nine points in the period, Winslow made some timely plays and managed to get on the scoreboard and as a team the Blue Devils finally got to the free throw line.
At the end of the day, there are plenty of positives to take from Duke's win Wednesday night. Shooting 65.2 percent from the field is impressive against any team, let alone the notoriously difficult Badgers. The defense kept Kaminsky in check for most of the evening, and rendered Dekker a virtual non-entity. But nothing is more impressive than the fact that the Blue Devils were able to go into a hostile environment against the No. 2 team in the nation, go away from the regular blueprint, and still win relatively handily.
That's the big takeaway from the biggest game of the college basketball season to date. And that's the reason why this Duke team has a chance to be special.
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