***Updated***
Now that I am a little more awake (wrote the first stab at this about 1 am), I wanted to spend a few minutes focusing on Duke's losses this season. Duke has fallen six times, losses to #5 Kansas (94-83), #3 Arizona (72-66), #4 Syracuse (91-89, OT) and #19 UNC (74-66) all are talent on talent type games, but their losses to Clemson (72-59) and Notre Dame (79-77) are more noteable. Unfortunately, all six losses were either neutral site or away games, so Duke is undefeated at Cameron so far this season. Duke's final score in all but the Clemson game is above our season average 65.2 PPG, so we have a challenge regards of keeping Duke off the board. In the Clemson game, Duke took a 10 point lead into halftime, but Clemson stepped up their perimeter shooting in the second half while forcing Duke into bad shots most of the entire second half. Duke shot a season low 34% from the field and 32% from behind the arc in this game. If the Hokies can force the ball away from Duke's two main scorers, they will stand a chance of competing in this game. Duke was also badly outrebounded in the loss to Clemson, 48-30 which played a major role in Clemson climbing back into the game. They limited Duke to eight offensive rebounds while grabbing fourteen of their own, leading to 27 points. Tech's big men need to be ready to get the ball and put it back up strong.
The Hokies head to Cameron Indoor Arena after a tough loss to NC State 71-64. You don't want to call this GroundHog Day
(in honor of the passing of Director Harold Ramis), but the same mistakes seem to repeat themselves game after game, even in the recent win. Poor free throw shooting, poor defensive rebounding, turnovers, and second chance points. The Hokies need to pick one of the two area's to focus on in either the turnovers or rebounding to show some credible improvement if they have a hope of beating Duke on the road. If they can limit possessions, and play solid ball control offense with high percentage shots, than they will stay competitive. If they don't, then this game could quickly revert to one of the twenty plus point losses.
Duke is led by freshman sensation Jabari Parker and sophomore Rodney Hood on the offensive side of the ball. They combine for about 35 points per game, 13 rebounds and 6 assists from the three and four spots on the floor. Slowing down this pair of phenoms will be critical, as Duke comes in averaging over 80 points a game right now. For the Hokies to be competitive they need to find a way to limit that to somewhere in the 50's.
This isn't a game where Tech will be able to rely on its passive defensive process that has worked in recent games because Duke is too good of a shooting team for that, averaging 45% from the floor and over 40% from behind the arc. Duke attempts almost 23 three pointers a game, so they get 28 points a game strictly from behind the arc on average. Boxing out once Duke attempts a shot will play a huge role, because if we give them 12-15 second chances, they will likely turn that into 15-20 points.
Hopefully Duke comes in with a little overhang from their recent win over #1 Syracuse and the Hokies punch them in the mouth early and often. Duke needs this win though to keep them in the top seeds for the ACC tournament and a hope at a top four seeding in the NCAA's so expect Coach K to have them ready. Hopefully we don't get to see JJ pull a Jim Boeheim in the waning seconds of the game to cost the Hokies a chance at a win.
Game can be found on television on ESPNU or
HERE on the radio
Comments
I said that about our defensive approach last week too. It works against average to below average offensive teams, but Duke can shoot and if we give a team like that open looks they will make us pay.
Yep. Duke will not only pick us apart with their outside shooting, but with their guard play against our zone. they have always been out of this world with penetrating and kicking to an open man against zone. Need to man up against them.
I thought the same thing when I was going to look at them but the assist numbers don't seem to support it. I think with their talent primarily being at their forward positions this year, Coach K has relied more on a standard set of getting the ball inside to allow Parker and Hood to work. Hood does step outside to attempt three's at about five a game though, so we have to be cognizant of it. I anticipate that JJ will stay more in the 2-3 zone, but stress the importance of stepping out to have a hand in the face of their perimeter shooters.
I feel like the last 4 games we finally switched to zone defense and it was keeping us in these games. The first half against NCSU we stuck with the same game plan but TJ Warren was just too good against the zone and we needed to make a change. Once we put Wilson on him, it slowed NCSU down for a little bit, but then our players got tired from the man to man defense and they pulled away. I think we are going to have a similar problem with Duke because they have multiple players who can be dominant on the offensive end. But I will watch and hope we can somehow pull it off.
I don't always hate Duke, but...wait yes I do
Updated with a look at Duke's losses.
...and their off. Time for the Hokies to put in work.
Duke's D is making us wet the court..
15-2 Duke already. Ouch.
This is turning into VCU 2.0
It's over Johnny.
Amazing to see the massive step back the VT program has taken the last few years. Thanks Weaver
Wow, step away to feed the kid and come back to Duke leading 24-4. Definitely not how I saw this one going. Ugly.
***NINE Offensive Rebounds for Duke already. 10 points off those. GRRR
I know Duke's a pretty good team. I know we aren't anywhere near good. But Jesus.......
32-20 at halftime. The boys put on a good spurt there to close the half. They are doing what they need to regarding Duke shooting the ball. Held them to 36% from the field, and 23% from behind the arc. On a normal day this would be a 25 point lead at the half. Now we just need to find a way to keep scoring consistently.
It is hard to convince anyone that the Hokies are outplaying Duke, but I like our " lunchpail" attitude. If we could make a few short buckets, Duke would be sweating.
Duke doesn't have anyone who can handle Wilson if he drives on them.
Holy cow it's only a 7 point game. 34-27 Duke.
It's like we refuse to believe we're really bad so we keep trying. That's a good thing I suppose.
So is this our new game plan?
Play bad basketball with such effort and conviction that we convince the other team that they should be playing bad basketball as well?
No wonder we're keeping games close lately...
Well Duke stretched it back out in the end. 66-48 final, we never fully recovered from the big lead we gave them out the gate. We had moments where we closed the lead to single digits but Duke always seemed to respond with a big three or a couple of floaters from the corner of the lane. They came in well versed on breaking the 2-3 zone. JJ really need to switch it up, even to a diamond and one, just to give them a different look.
14 offensive rebounds led to 18 points for Duke. 15 turnovers contributed another 22 points. These two areas accounted for almost two thirds of Dukes points in the game. We did a decent job covering down on Jabari Parker, but Rodney Hood went for 21 and Rasheed Sulaimon picked up some slack, hitting four big threes and contributing 15 points.
Tech surprisingly worked the ball inside all night, only attempting 9 three pointers on the evening. The foul calls were a little lacking so Tech only attempted seven free throws. Shocker, they hit six of them for a season high 85.7% from the charity stripe. Trevor Thompson leading the way with 15 points on the night. Barksdale and Van Zegeren chipped in nine points a piece. Eddie with another bad night shooting, going 3 for 12 and 1 for 6 from behind the arc. Devin matched Eddie unfortunately in the 3 for 12 shooting from the field. As hard as this game was played inside the lane, pretty shocking there were only 22 fouls called total, 11 to each team. Duke was held below 40% from the field and barely shot 30% from behind the arc. The big difference tonight is that Duke took fifteen more shots than the Hokies with the turnovers and offensive rebounds.
Next game up is #19 North Carolina at Cassell at 230pm on Saturday March 1st. Coverage is on ESPN3.
I completely understand what Coach Johnson was trying to accomplish with the 2-3 zone but its almost pointless against a team like Duke. If Duke's gonna shoot bad from the field and have an off night it will be regardless of the defensive assignment. It's too hard to rebound against Duke in a zone and it showed with their offensive rebounds. Sure we flash out and put a hand in their face, but there were countless times that happened and we were so out of control that the Duke player would just drive right by us.
JJ is playing it safe (with his job on the line) with the zone and just relying on hopefully the other team having an off night. What these young players need is practice in a man to man defense. Knowing when to help, switch, etc is a feeling that is only gained with game experience. The 2-3 zone is being used to hide poor defensive players. I would have rather gotten blown out playing man to man vs Duke then playing it safe especially at this point of the season. Need to get out of this zone (or at least switch back and forth when rest is needed).
Well I think in fairness to JJ we only had an 8 man rotation last night (with Beyer as one of those 8), so running man to man would have been rough. Especially for guys like Eddie and Wilson who almost never came out. The troubling part of it was the start of the game on offense. Duke was playing a high pressure full-court man to man press just like VCU and we were have all kinds of trouble even getting a decent look. No off the ball screens.
at lease we covered the spread?
UVA, who has the best defense in the country statistically gave up 69 points at Duke. Tech gave up 66, JJ is doing good things with the zone but the offense on the other hand.....
This is actually spot on, its Duke's lowest offensive output on the season, tied with two other games they played. Their win over #1 Syracuse and their loss to #4 Arizona, so the Hokies did do something few have done this year. It was about 15 points below Duke's season average. We just couldn't score on the other end due to turnovers and second chances.
Hey, According to E$PN, we put up such a good fight that Duke had to rally to beat us.....
Although with how espn's quality has gone down the last few years, I think I found who they have writing their game recaps...
He has a friend that actually writes the recap, once you clicked on the rally button, the actually summary says that Hood scores 21 as Duke routs Virginia Tech. Got to love the inconsistency in all facets, from the combine to mens basketball.