Wake Forest shot 61% from the field and outrebounded Duke by 11 but still lost by 10 points to an suprisingly effective Duke team. While the Duke defense had plagued them recently, it was the Blue Devil offense that carried them tonight. The Blue Devils posted an offensive efficiency of 143.5, which was the 2nd highest for an ACC team this season (top efficiency was 146.9 by Miami against North Florida).
Duke's offense was led by Jon Scheyer and Gerald Henderson who each topped 30 points. Henderson finished with 35 points on 11-15 shooting and went 12-14 from the free throw line. Jon Scheyer finished with 30 points on 8-16 shooting, but did most of his damage from the three point line going 5-10. Like Henderson, Scheyer tallied double-figure free throw attempts going 9-11.
The conspiracy theorists out there will point to the 36-16 free throw attempt advantage that the Blue Devils held, but don't be so quick to jump to conclusions. Wake Forest was only called for four more fouls than Duke and started fouling in the last minute which accounts for the advantage.
Other than Duke's free throw advantage the Blue Devils counted on a huge 20-6 turnover advantage to gain extra possessions. In particular Duke used the charge to their advantage several times.
The Elliot Williams experiment continued as Williams started for the 2nd straight game. Williams finished with 11 points and 4 steals including a key run in the first half that helped the Blue Devils open up the game. Williams held Jeff Teague scoreless for a good part of the first half and showed his ability to turn his defense into easy baskets for the Blue Devils.
Wake Forest was led by 28 points from Jeff Teague and 26 points and 11 rebounds from James Johnson.
Duke moves to 8-4 in the ACC with the win while Wake Forest drops to 7-5. The loss for Wake is even more important as it drops the Demon Deacons to fifth place and outside of the first round bye in the ACC tournament.
Factor of the Game
There's no question TO% was the deciding factor of this one. As Duke went on their first-half run, Wake Forest's TO% spiked to 54%. This means Wake was turning it over on over half of their possessions to that point in the game. As Wake made it a game, they went without a turnover for nearly 20 minutes until a couple turnovers killed their chances.
