Duke Basketball: 3 takeaways from Blue Devils romp over Bellarmine

3. Duke struggled from beyond the arc in their first two games before tonight, but have also been inconsistent inside the paint – so what should it be?

The Blue Devils have proven themselves to be two, completely different teams in their opening three games: they can be a team that struggles to knock down outside shots but score at will inside, and they can also be a team can shoot the lights out from beyond the arc but also get outscored inside the point.

Obviously, the fact that they can do either is fantastic and proves they can be versatile – but it also yields the ugly truth of inconsistency.  Of what I mentioned in the previous paragraph, the former was true for the Blue Devils against Coppin State, while the latter happened against Bellarmine.

Against Coppin State, the Blue Devils were not awful from beyond the arc, shooting 9-27 for a 33.3% clip – but they were dominant inside, outscoring the Eagles in the paint, 44-24.  For context, despite Duke owning a better shooting percentage from three-point land, Coppin State actually outscored them from three, knocking down one more (Coppin had 10 to Duke’s nine).

Duke’s game against Bellarmine saw them get outscored in the paint by the Knights (38-30), but the Blue Devils were unconscious from three-point territory, draining 13 bombs to finish with a dead-even 50% for the night.

Both games, noticeably, were wins.  However, against Michigan State, the Blue Devils were outscored in the paint (30-28) and, despite knocking down the same number of three’s as the Spartans, owned a worse shooting percentage (25% to 21.7%) – and lost.

A lot of this can be traced to Duke being so young, but they desperately need to find a consistent identity.  Against teams that are, statistically, worse, they have either feasted inside the paint or from beyond the arc – but against the one team that could match them, they failed in both categories.

Again, like their turnovers, that will ail them against some of the top competition in the ACC – and, given they do not have much time to work out these issues, it will also present a problem against Illinois on Tuesday.

Luckily, outside of a Dec. 16 game at Notre Dame and a Dec. 29 home contest versus Pitt, the Blue Devils will not see major ACC competition until the beginning of January – meaning they have some time to remedy these issues and, hopefully, nail down an identity before they see the likes of Florida State, Virginia Tech, and Louisville – all opponents they will encounter in January.