We are four games in now and can start to get a sense of this Duke team’s parameters. So let’s take a look at a few things as Kansas looms next week.
First, Duke’s defense is already imposing.
So far, Duke is giving up just 58.75 ppg. Texas had 60, Western Carolina 54, Army 59 and Indiana State 62.
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Texas shot just 29% on threes and 32% overall and had 16 turnovers. Western Carolina shot 15% on threes and 31% overall with 14 turnovers. Army shot 24% from behind the line and 31% overall with 17 turnovers while Indiana State managed 30% on their threes and 36% overall with 18 turnovers.
On an individual basis, Cameron Boozer is leading Duke in scoring (22.5), rebounding (10.2), assists (4.2) and blocks (1.8).
He also leads the team in minutes, with 22.8 per game.
Things get a bit interesting after that.
We’re not surprised that Isaiah Evans is second in minutes with 23.3, but we are surprised to see that Cayden Boozer is in third place here with 22.5. Patrick Ngongba is fourth with 22.3, then Caleb Foster with 21.8. Dame Sarr is getting 21, Nik Khamenia 20.8, Maliq Brown 16.5 and Darren Harris 15.3.
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All rotation players except for Brown are getting at least 7.3 ppg.
Ngongba is second in rebounding with 7.0 per game. Khamenia is grabbing 4.8 boards a game. All the rotation players except for Harris are averaging at least 3.3 rebounds. Between them, Foster, Cayden Boozer, Sarr, Evans and Harris are pulling down nearly 16 rebounds an outing.
The two leading assist mens are the Boozer brothers – Cameron has his 4.3 while Cayden is getting 4.0. Ngongba and Khamenia are sneaky good passers with 2.5 and 2.3 respectively.
Sarr leads in steals with 2.0, just ahead of Boozer’s 1.8.
Collectively, Duke is averaging 10.5 turnovers, which isn’t bad for this early.
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Shooting percentages get interesting too. Brown leads at 70.6%. Ngongba is next up at 58.1%. Harris is shooting 56.3%. Cameron Boozer checks in at 54.9%. Somewhat surprisingly, Evans is shooting just 38.% overall.
He’s got to be better on the threes, right?
Nope.
Evans is hitting 34.6% on threes, good for sixth place on the team, not counting Jack Scott, who is 1-1.
Not surprisingly, at least not to us, Harris is the best three point shooter so far, hitting a highly impressive 57.1%.
However, Foster and Sarr are both hitting 50% while Cameron Boozer is hitting 36.8% and Khamenia 35.7%.
Evans will shoot better soon enough and he tends to get red hot and hit a bunch in a row. He’ll be fine.
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However, at the moment he’s way down the list of Duke’s three point shooters.
Not as far down as Cayden Boozer though: he came in with plenty of questions about his shot and he hasn’t shot brilliantly, to be sure. His three point percentage is just 14.3 so far.
However, he’s been quite good from the line.
Harris leads there with 100%, followed closely by Boozer and Evans, both at 86.7%.
These are really just snapshots. What matters for any team is how well everyone works together and how well deficiencies are either masked or compensated for and, of course, will, which cannot be statistically measured.
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So far, things look promising and as Brown rounds into form and the players get to know each other better, Duke should improve correspondingly.
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