Duke Defeats A Gutty NWMSU 69-63 But The End Of The Game Was Tense

Pretty much what we warned you about.

Duke got a game from Northwest Missouri State, maybe more than most people expected - but not you if you read our preview.

If you did, you knew this team was 100-5 over the last 105 games, including two D-II national titles. That’s not an accident.

We knew these guys would come in believing they could win (and nearly did). We knew they were well coached (they were). And their confidence showed.

Duke, by contrast, had freshmen in key roles and a lot of players who were being asked to take on new roles.

If you wanted to set up a dream scenario for a shocking upset you couldn’t have planned one much better. Bearcats coach Ben McCollum knew it. Coach K knew it. Did Duke’s players?

Well if they didn’t they do now.

Northwest - that’s what the locals call the team - fell behind early 11-2 but Duke’s offense just wasn’t clicking.

Freshman Vernon Carey picked up two early fouls and appeared rattled. He was subbed out and didn’t play a whole lot after that, finishing with just under 9.5 minutes.

Despite that, after the game Coach K praised him, saying that he did a lot of very positive things to help his team.

In the first half, fellow freshman Matthew Hurt didn’t seem assertive and wasn’t getting the ball much and when he did, he couldn't connect.

At the half, Jack White missed a chippy and at the half Duke had just 28 points. Fortunately for the Blue Devils, NWMSU had just 22.

However, they had figured out that they could play with Duke.

In the second half, Duke pulled away and began to look dominant. Hurt’s offense began to click and Duke’s defense was at times suffocating. Cassius Stanley pulled off a block that was truly impressive and Duke built a 19 point lead. And you’d think that would have been that.

Only it wasn’t.

The same dynamic we saw in the FIBA World Cup kicked in as the less talented but vastly more experienced team charged back against its more talented opponent. In the last :37 seconds, Northwest hit two threes and positioned themselves for a brilliant comeback. What we saw in the end was a team that knew what to do to win - and nearly did.

For Duke, there was a mixed bag. First of all this team has the potential to be just ferocious on defense. In one first-half stretch, Jordan Goldwire was just superb. Having Jones and Goldwire on defense is a real luxury. It’s like Thing one and Thing Two coming at you, causing chaos.

And not all that far behind them you have Wendell Moore. The rookie didn’t shoot well - he was hardly alone in that - but when you have all three of those guys on the court, that’s an imposing triad. All three are really, really good on D.

Of course Javin DeLaurier and Jack White are both solid defenders and Cassius Stanley could emerge as an absolute shutdown defender. That kid has the quickest feet we’ve seen since Ricky Price, who never really figured out how good a defender his quickness would have allowed him to be.

Getting back to offense, Jones, Hurt and Wendell took 15, 16 and 11 shots respectively and hit 6, 8 and two if those (the trio hit 16-42 while the team as a whole hit 23-58).

In a perfect world, you want better distribution and a higher percentage. As the season goes on, Moore will shoot better and Stanley will be more aggressive. Alex O’ Connell generally played well but he missed some chippies.

After the game, Coach K talked about missed opportunities and the difference between shots inside and finishing. It’s a good point. Duke had lots of missed shots around the basket. Carey, Hurt, Jack White, Stanley and O’ Connell all missed a bunch of those.

The good news is that those are correctable errors.

This team is going to build out from defense anyway so give the offense a little time to come around. And when Carey is more effective inside, when players are actually finishing, everything will change.

Duke also forced 21 turnovers. Coach K has compared defense to an out-of-control car and said that when defense is good and aggressive, you won’t know where it’s coming from.

We saw that in this game. At times Northwest just didn’t know what was coming and had trouble hanging on to the ball.

This was notably true in the closing seconds. Trying to get another three off, Bearcat Wes Dreamer got turned around by Goldwire and lost precious time. He tossed the ball back to a teammate - we think it was #5 Kirk Finley - who shot from near half court.

It was really too bad that after showing such heart and tenacity that Northwest fell apart then, albeit briefly.

This is a team that could win some ACC games. They’re really good and very, very well coached.

We’ll make a prediction here: after this season, McCollum is done with D-II. He’s shown immense ability and someone is going to throw enough money at him this spring to convince him to move to D-1.

Just as a mental exercise, imagine that Northwest and Wake Forest switched basketball programs. We’re certain the new Wake Forest would win more games than the old one. Certainly they’d show up and play the last part of their games with some heart and passion.

That guy is one of the best coaches around, he’s just 38 and he’s hungry. Remember his name because you will hear it again and it won’t be that long until you do.

*In our original story we reversed the three point shooting. Duke was actually 2-16 while NWMSU was 15-34. Wishful thinking on our part.

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