Duke 75 Syracuse 65

[DragonFire]

If you were wondering how Duke would respond without Williamson, the answer is, pretty well. Syracuse did lead the Blue Devils by five at the half, but Duke held Syracuse without a point for nearly five minutes in the middle of the half, and then just a single field goal in the last four minutes as they went on a 17-9 kick to finish the game. Syracuse shot just 34.3% for the game, while Duke hit nine three pointers against the always tough Boeheim zone defense. It will be interesting to see how the voters treat Duke in the polls, but I wouldn't be surprised to see them get significant benefit of the doubt with the win sans Zion.

[nikeman49]

Great moment in pregame to see Coach K meet Boeheim to embrace with 30,000 plus cheering him. That’s what college basketball is all about.

[jvdfc]

Barrett was hot the whole game. That was the difference in this one. He is a real streaky shooter. If he wasn't so hot the Blue Devils lose this one. But he was on. Cuse played extremely hard all night. Great crowd as well.

[The Professor]

Duke is just extremely good, simply put. The UNC loss happened after Zion went out with his injury in the first minute of play and was so sudden, but give K and his staff time to adjust to his absence and get this result. They’ve still got 3 more top 10 players on their team.

It’s going to take a Herculean effort for someone to knock them out of the NCAA tournament next month, assuming they get Zion back. Without him it will still be difficult to eliminate them from the tournament.

[futurecoach]

Duke is just extremely good, simply put. The UNC loss happened after Zion went out with his injury in the first minute of play and was so sudden, but give K and his staff time to adjust to his absence and get this result. They’ve still got 3 more top 10 players on their team.

It’s going to take a Herculean effort for someone to knock them out of the NCAA tournament next month, assuming they get Zion back. Without him it will still be difficult to eliminate them from the tournament.

 

It basically comes down to one thing and one thing only. If Duke is hitting from the outside no one can beat them. However they have shown that they definitely can be beat in a one and out tournament if they are cold from the outside.

[The Professor]

It basically comes down to one thing and one thing only. If Duke is hitting from the outside no one can beat them. However they have shown that they definitely can be beat in a one and out tournament if they are cold from the outside.

That’s true. It knocked a great UK team out of a likely national championship in 2010 in the regional vs WV.