NCAA Basketball: 25 biggest offseason winners heading into 2021-22 season

There weren’t many transactions that actually occurred for Duke this offseason. They lost Matthew Hurt and DJ Steward to the NBA Draft, while forwards Henry Coleman and Jaemyn Brakefield transferred out. They did get back Jeremy Roach and Wendell Moore for another season, along with picking up Marquette transfer forward Theo John, who has over 100 career starts in the frontcourt.

The reason why I have the Blue Devils this high is that they’re going through the head coaching transition as good as they can ask for. Head coach and Hall of Famer Mike Krzyzewski is one of the greatest of all time but at 74 years old was going to retire soon. He gets to go out with a team with title aspirations, while head-coach-in-waiting Jon Scheyer gets not only a year to prepare for the gig, but also remains the lead recruiter for the 2022 class.

And if recruits are worried about the future coaching change at Duke, they aren’t showing it. Top-50 forward Kyle Filipowski committed a month ago, while just recently landing five-star shooting guard Dariq Whitehead in the 2022 class. It’s already a good start and they reportedly are in a good position with five-star targets Anthony Black, Dereck Lively, and Mark Mitchell.

Landing two of them would give them a likely top-5 class for next offseason and set up Coach Scheyer with a really good roster when he takes over. Everything has been handled well and the Blue Devils aren’t going to go anywhere, even after Coach Krzyzewski retires.