Duke played the entire ACC Tournament without its starting point guard and its starting center. Yet, the Blue Devils rolled. Then, Duke navigated the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament with just 13 minutes off the bench from Patrick Ngongba II. Against St. John’s in the Sweet 16, Caleb Foster burst back onto the scene with a heroic 19-minute effort. But in the Elite Eight, the Blue Devils’ injuries finally caught up with them.
Again, Foster and Ngongba both came off the bench. For the first time since his foot injury, Ngongba played more minutes than Maliq Brown, who was dealing with back spasms. Foster played 14 minutes off the bench. Neither looked 100 percent, and against a Dan Hurley team, there’s nowhere to hide.
Caleb Foster and Patrick Ngongba’s minutes were costly vs. UConn
Hurley, along with his top offensive analyst Luke Murray, who is leaving to become the head coach of Boston College after the season, has designed an offense predicated on constant intricate off-ball movement. Everybody touches the ball, everybody sets and runs off screens, and everybody can score. All five Huskies starters average in double figures.
Scheyer opted to hide Cameron Boozer, almost always his slowest-footed defender, on UConn’s point guard, typically either Silas Demary Jr. or Malachi Smith. As the primary initiator, they typically do the least off-ball movement, so it largely kept Boozer out of those actions. Caleb Foster wasn’t so lucky…