Duke Basketball: 3 takeaways from Blue Devils romp over Bellarmine

2. Despite the overwhelming number of them against Bellarmine, turnovers were not a major issue – but Duke will need to clean it up as soon as possible

One of the issues of this Duke team being so young is that they tend to be a bit more careless with the basketball.  To their credit, they were great with this stat when it came against Michigan State – but they were atrocious against Coppin State in their first game, and now against Bellarmine.

Again, the Blue Devils, despite the loss, were great against Michigan State in limiting turnovers – they actually had three less than the Spartans, 15-12.  But the differential against Coppin State was notably awful, with Duke turning the ball over 22 times while Coppin committed just eight turnovers.

Against Bellarmine, the number of turnovers erred more on the side of what Duke did against Coppin. Although the Knights committed more (20), Duke still gave up the ball 18 times – which Bellarmine took advantage of, outscoring the Blue Devils on points off turnovers, 18-16.

With tonight’s game, the Blue Devils are now averaging 17.3 turnovers a game – which ranks around the 240s nationally.  For context, that is four more turnovers than Duke averaged last season (13.2 a game).  This season, they are turning the ball over on 23.3% of their possessions.

Those turnovers can be traced individually, as well.  Hurt, for example, has only committed three turnovers on the season.  Star freshman Jalen Johnson, on the other hand, had four in the Bellarmine game alone – after committing eight, combined, against Michigan State and Coppin State.

He is not alone, either.  Jeremy Roach has eight turnovers on the season, Wendell Moore has seven, and Jordan Goldwire also has seven.  If these numbers continue into ACC play, teams will feast on the free opportunities presented to them by Duke.  Friendly reminder, Bellarmine – in their first-ever game as a Div. I team – outscored Duke in points-off-turnovers.