With two losses last week, Duke blew its chance to play for the ACC regular-season title against its biggest rival.
But the stakes are still high for the Blue Devils heading into their regular-season finale.
A win against No. 5 North Carolina Saturday at 8:15 p.m. at the Dean E. Smith Center in Chapel Hill would give No. 17 Duke a double bye in next week’s ACC tournament and an extra day of rest for a team that desperately needs it. A loss would lock the Blue Devils out of the top four and force them to win four games in four days to take home the ACC championship, a feat that has never been accomplished.
Although Duke beat the Tar Heels 86-78 in Durham Feb. 9, two very different teams will be meeting eight miles down U.S. Highway 15-501 this weekend.
Grayson Allen had one of his best games of the year with 25 points against North Carolina, but has been a shell of himself since then. The Jacksonville, Fla., native is averaging 6.5 points on 23.8 percent shooting in his last five contests and sat out last Saturday’s loss at Miami due to a left ankle injury.
“Grayson’s not really been able to practice. You can tell he’s not there right now,” Blue Devil head coach Mike Krzyzewski said after Duke’s win against No. 15 Florida State Tuesday. “We’ll see in the next week what we can do with him as we get into, not just our last game of the ACC, but the NCAA tournament. We've got to get him healthy because he’s too valuable for us.”
Allen’s limitations have opened the door for Frank Jackson, though, and the freshman rose to the occasion Tuesday with a career-high 22 points. Jackson has shown a penchant for stepping up against elite competition in the last month, and he will get another chance against counterpart Joel Berry II.
Krzyzewski said Friday that Jackson will start Saturday and that all of the team's players were able to practice and will be available.
The point guard was North Carolina’s only scorer in double figures in an ugly 53-43 loss at No. 23 Virginia Monday and has been one of its most reliable offensive players with at least 12 points in seven of his last eight games. With Blue Devil senior Matt Jones likely to match up for the second time against ACC Player of the Year frontrunner Justin Jackson, Frank Jackson may be tasked with containing Berry on his own.
“I just looked to stay aggressive every single game. Coaches always tell me to be myself, to go out there and do my thing,” Jackson said. “I’m just trying to create for my teammates. I’m playing the full 40 minutes hard and trying to make every play count.”
The Tar Heels’ two biggest weapons play mostly on the perimeter, but the biggest difference between the game in Durham a month ago and Saturday’s showdown will likely be in the post. Senior Isaiah Hicks was a late scratch with a strained hamstring against the Blue Devils (23-7, 11-6 in the ACC) and has returned to play in every game since.
Although Hicks has not been very effective since his injury, averaging 5.4 points and 4.0 fouls in just 18.4 minutes per game, he is another weapon Duke will have to contend with in an already deep frontcourt.
Hicks, fellow senior Kennedy Meeks and freshman Tony Bradley all stand 6-foot-9 or taller and play more than 15 minutes per game, helping the Tar Heels (25-6, 13-4) to the largest rebounding margin in the nation.
Forwards Jayson Tatum and Amile Jefferson led the Blue Devils to an improbable rebounding advantage in the teams’ first meeting. That will be a tougher task with Hicks crashing the glass instead of 6-foot-8 reserve forward Luke Maye.
Like Allen, Jefferson has been playing through pain lingering from a right-foot bone bruise he suffered in January, but the 6-foot-9 graduate student shook it off to notch his first double-double of conference play on Senior Night against the Seminoles.
“It was about not pacing because that is what I have been doing since I’ve been injured. I’ve been playing, but I’ve been playing not to get hurt—thinking about my foot, thinking about pain,” Jefferson said. “I was just going to go out there and give it all I got. That was enough. Once I did that, I stopped worrying about pain. I stopped worrying about injuries and I just played.”
Jefferson will have to generate the same energy away from his home crowd Saturday. He and Jones are Duke’s only scholarship players that have lost in Chapel Hill, and North Carolina will be hungry to clinch sole possession of the ACC regular-season crown—the Tar Heels have already sealed the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament—and snap a skid of four home losses to the Blue Devils in the last five years.
Two of those Duke wins have been decided on the final possession, and Saturday’s game is shaping up to come down to the wire again.
“The guys haven’t been playing bad. They’ve been playing well, and two of the guys have been hurt, so I think they’ve been doing a terrific job,” Krzyzewski said in reference to the team’s two losses last week. “All these games are close. All these teams are so darn good, and [you] just try to win those last few possessions.”
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