Tale of 2 halves for Blue Devils, who thwart scrappy Bulldogs after tense second half

<p>Brandon Ingram kept the Bulldogs at bay with several timely baskets, and his two free throws in the final minute helped Duke ward off Yale's last-gasp comeback bid.</p>

Brandon Ingram kept the Bulldogs at bay with several timely baskets, and his two free throws in the final minute helped Duke ward off Yale's last-gasp comeback bid.

PROVIDENCE, R.I.—It’s been a season of highs and lows for the Blue Devils.

Duke lost three straight contests to unranked opponents in January, but somehow found a way to beat then-No. 13 Louisville, then-No. 7 Virginia and then-No. 5 North Carolina in succession just one month later. 

Now, the fourth-seeded Blue Devils are heading to Anaheim, Calif., for the program’s 25th Sweet 16. But the road to California—much like the season itself—was anything but a straight one. In both Thursday’s 93-85 come-from-behind win against UNC-Wilmington and Saturday’s 71-64 defeat of Cinderella hopeful Yale, Duke overcame the inconsistency and sporadic play that comes with youth with just enough talent to get the job done—just as it has done all year.

The Bulldogs closed to within three with less than 40 seconds to play Saturday, nearly clawing all the way back from a 27-point hole. It was a gutsy second-half performance from an underdog with nothing to lose, one that entirely flipped the momentum of the game and would have threatened to splinter the mental fortitude of a young Blue Devil team.

But although Duke certainly bent Saturday, it did not break, keeping its season and postseason dreams intact—barely.

“We’ve been in so many difficult situations throughout the season,” freshman Luke Kennard said. “We’ve had a lot of adversity, but we just stuck together as a group. We’ve had ups and downs throughout the season—big wins and tough losses—but I’m just proud of the way we stuck together. And we’re in the Sweet 16 now, so it’s special.”

The Blue Devils entered the NCAA tournament warding off comparisons to Duke teams that faltered in the opening round of the Big Dance in years past—namely the 2013-14 squad that fell to 14th-seeded Mercer and the 2011-12 team that lost to 15th-seeded Lehigh. 

In the opening half against the the Seahawks Thursday, UNC-Wilmington shot 51.5 percent from the floor and 6-of-12 from beyond the arc to take a 43-40 lead into the locker room. The Blue Devils—who have lived and died with their 3-point shooting this season—shot just 3-of-10 from downtown. Only freshman Brandon Ingram—who poured in 11 first-half points—stayed true to form, hitting a late triple on the last play of the half to cut the Seahawk lead in half and give Duke momentum heading into halftime.

“We told our guys that a big key for the game was to be ready to shoot,” head coach Mike Krzyzewski said. “And Wilmington pressed, and they created this full-court thing where you were more catch-and-dribble.”

But an entirely different squad returned to the court for the final 20 minutes of the game. The Blue Devils enjoyed a 10-0 run in the first five minutes of the second half to reclaim the lead, feeding graduate student center Marshall Plumlee for dunk after dunk and getting to the foul line at will, where sophomore Grayson Allen made 15-of-17 shots.

That same team came out to start Saturday’s game against Yale—Duke was firing on all cylinders right out of the gates, with Ingram, Allen and Kennard all hitting their first 3-point attempts of the afternoon. The Blue Devils went on to shoot 9-of-15 from downtown and 60.7 percent from the field while holding the Bulldogs to 34.4 percent shooting from the floor and 1-of-11 from deep, opening a 48-25 halftime lead. Allen finished the first period with 22 points—just three points shy of Yale’s total—with Ingram and Kennard contributing 11 points apiece.

“For us, the 3-point shot is something that can give us energy,” Allen said. “We do have a lot of shooters on our team where we can get hot like we did in the first half.... It can go like that for us where guys can get hot, and I think as a team we feed off of each other when we’re doing that.”

If the Blue Devils feasted on the momentum of 3-pointer after 3-pointer in the first 20 minutes, they were fighting for scraps in the second half. Yale ramped up its defensive pressure, forcing eight Duke turnovers that turned into nine Bulldog points. And the Blue Devils went cold from beyond the arc, hitting just 2-of-8 from downtown and 27.3 percent of their shots overall.

As the offense sputtered, the Duke defense struggled as well, allowing Yale to fight its way back into the game with 20 points in the paint and 11 offensive rebounds in the second half. Krzyzewski and Plumlee tried to light fires under the rest of the Blue Devils, but the Bulldogs continued to nip at their heels into the final minute.

Ultimately, the deficit proved too big for Yale to overcome, and Duke’s torrid first half and 6-for-7 performance at the charity stripe in the final minute sent the defending national champions safely into the tournament’s second weekend. But the second-half struggles—on the glass and behind the arc—brought back lingering concerns from regular-season losses to Syracuse and Pittsburgh.

When Duke shoots well from beyond the arc for 40 minutes, the Blue Devils are nearly unbeatable. When the shots fall for 20 minutes, it still might get the job done, as was the case Saturday.

But against top-seeded Oregon, which awaits Duke in Anaheim, 20 excellent minutes of basketball might not be enough.

Luckily for the Blue Devils, they survived against the Bulldogs and will get the opportunity to learn valuable lessons from the near-collapse that almost derailed the season.

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