Duke basketball: Blue Devils hit low not seen in nearly 40 years

Duke basketball pulled off a feat that hasn’t happened since 1982 after falling to Illinois.

The start of the season hasn’t been too kind to young college basketball teams. Kentucky has struggled to get anything going while Duke has now lost two home games, marking the first time since 1982 the Blue Devils have suffered two defeats at Cameron Indoor Stadium this early.

There is no shame falling to Michigan State in the Champions Classic or Illinois in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge since both are top 10 teams, but Duke is usually pretty unbeatable at home. The lack of fans at Cameron Indoor Stadium has certainly hurt since the Cameron Crazies create one of the most intimidating home-court advantages in college basketball, but there are more problems that Mike Krzyzewski has to deal with than just having to create an intimidating atmosphere without spectators.

Duke basketball hasn’t started this poorly in four decades

We have seen flashes of brilliance from the Blue Devils, such as Jalen Johnson’s 19 point, 19 rebound debut and the dominant first five minutes Duke put together against Michigan State last week. The issue is that they are just flashes and not complete efforts as the Blue Devils play more like a group of individuals than a true team, something that will take time.

Having a rotation full of freshmen and sophomores usually isn’t an issue since coaches have a full preseason and training camp to get guys used to working together as well as figure out the right rotations. The pandemic significantly cut into that time frame, forcing coaches like Krzyzewski and John Calipari to mold their team on the fly.

Those flaws get exposed against more experienced power conference foes, like the Michigan State game last week. Duke clearly had the most talented players on the floor in that game but the Spartans had more experience playing as a team, working together in unison to share the basketball and generate offense.

The good news for the Blue Devils is that the ACC isn’t a juggernaut akin to the Big Ten so there will be plenty of time for Krzyzewski to figure out how to get his players to gel into one unit. Duke’s next four games are winnable ahead of a tough trip to Florida State on Jan. 2, so that should be a contest to mark down and look at whether the Blue Devils have really improved or if it will be a struggle for them to earn an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.

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