Duke guard Jared McCain reacts after scoring during the first half of a second-round college ... [+]
Jared McCain raised both of his arms in the air near midcourt and screamed in jubilation. The Duke freshman guard had just hit his sixth 3-pointer on six attempts on Sunday night, giving the Blue Devils a 24-point lead over James Madison with 2:29 remaining in the first half.
McCain wasn’t as effective in the second half, although that was in part because he was resting during a blowout. Led by its core of young players, No. 4 seed Duke cruised to a 93-55 victory over No. 12 James Madison in an NCAA men’s basketball tournament second round game at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y.
The Blue Devils advanced to face No. 1 seed Houston on Friday night in the South Region’s Sweet 16 in Dallas. Houston defeated Texas A&M, 100-95, in overtime late Sunday night.
McCain finished with 30 points and made a Duke NCAA tournament record 8-of-11 3-pointers. He became the first freshman since the tournament field expanded in 1985 to have 30 points and no turnovers, according to ESPN Stats & Info. Meanwhile, sophomore guard Tyrese Proctor (18 points), senior guard Jeremy Roach (15 points) and sophomore forward Kyle Filipowski (14 points) were also in double figures.
Duke is bucking the trend in men’s college basketball, where most of the top programs rely on transfers and veteran players and use Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) money to enhance their offers. Jon Scheyer, now in his second season as head coach after replacing legendary coach Mike Krzyzewski, has continued targeting the top high schoolers and international prospects to build his team around.
Of the Blue Devils’ top six scorers this season, five are freshmen or sophomores. Roach, a fourth-year player who is second on the team in scoring, is the lone exception.
Duke also only has two transfers on its roster: center Ryan Young, who is in his second season with the Blue Devils after playing at Northwestern for three years, and forward Neal Begovich, who played for Stanford for four years before joining the Blue Devils this season. Young and Begovich both graduated before heading to Duke. Young is averaging 2.8 points in 11.5 minutes per game entering Sunday, while Begovich has appeared in only eight games all season.
“You always take a look at the transfer portal nowadays, but since Coach K our foundation has been you try to recruit the best talent on and off the court,” said Chris Carrawell, Duke’s associate head coach who played for the Blue Devils for four seasons from 1996 to 2000. “In today’s age with the transfer portal, everybody’s looking at it, but you’ve got to get the right one. We don’t just want to bring anyone in.”
Of course, Duke’s core is not just made up of any young players. Year after year, the Blue Devils are near or on the top of the recruiting rankings. For instance, Duke’s high school class for 2022 was first in the 247Sports composite rankings, while its class of 2023 high school class was second.
Two members of Duke’s class of 2022 (Dereck Lively II and Dariq Whitehead) were selected in the first round of last year’s NBA draft following their freshman seasons. They followed in the footsteps of several other Duke players who were picked in the first round following their freshman years, including Jayson Tatum, R.J. Barrett, Zion Williamson and Paolo Banchero. In all, 19 Duke freshmen since 2011 have been first round picks.
McCain will almost certainly be the 20th. He is projected as the No. 18 pick in June’s draft, according to the Athletic’s Sam Vecenie’s most recent mock draft that was published last week. Filipowski, who could have been drafted last season but returned to school, is slotted at No. 15 in Vecenie’s mock draft.
Even if Filipowski and McCain depart, the Blue Devils should remain in an enviable position.
Duke’s incoming freshmen class is ranked first in the 247Sports Composite and features No. 1 ranked Cooper Flagg; No. 12 Isaiah Evans; No. 17 Kon Knueppel; and No. 18 Patrick Ngongba II. They have also signed Khaman Maluach, a 7-foot-1 center from South Sudan who plays for the NBA Academy Africa program.
ESPN’s Jonathan Givony last month projected that Flagg would be the No. 1 pick in the 2025 NBA draft, while Maluach would go No. 3 and Evans No. 13.
Speaking in Duke’s locker room after Sunday’s victory, Carrawell wouldn’t rule out that Duke would add a transfer. Still, he said the Blue Devils would be picky and add someone like Young, who was a good fit two years because the Blue Devils were looking for post players as well as a veteran who could provide leadership. Young is now one of Duke’s captains alongside Roach and Proctor.
“(Young) was perfect for us,” Carrawell said. “The fit was right. but you’ve got to be careful because we have this young talent. When you bring a transfer in, (Duke’s coaches wonder) are they looking to do their thing or are they looking to win big? In Ryan’s case, he hadn’t played in the (NCAA tournament before coming to Duke). That was the main focus.”
Scheyer, meanwhile, said it helps that Duke has a veteran like Roach on its roster. He mentioned Duke’s 2015 team that won the program’s most recent national title had talented freshmen such as Jahlil Okafor, Justise Winslow and Tyus Jones (all first round picks that year) but also senior Quinn Cook, the Blue Devils’ second-leading scorer who could mentor the younger players.
“There has to be some balance of course (of veterans and freshmen), but you can’t sit back and say, ‘This is exactly what you need’ because when you have a chance to bring in the freshmen that we did this year, or the freshmen for next year, we're going to do that every day of the week,” Scheyer said. “I think anybody would, if they could, or they tried to. But you still need experience and returning players. So for me, you try to find that balance. But that's the nature of being in college basketball in 2024.”
If Duke does add a transfer or multiple transfers, it will have to do so without having developed the long-term relationships that its coaching staff prefers with players to understand their motivations and backgrounds. Carrawell recalled that he met Roach when he was 16 and watched McCain for the first time when he was a sophomore in high school. By the time Duke signed those players, the coaches felt they had got to know them and project how they would fit in with the Blue Devils.
“We’ve always been a program that we go off our principles and our foundation,” Carrawell said. “We want the guys, if no NIL is involved, if no other factors are involved, do you want to play for the name on the front of the jersey? You’ve got to be careful because when you bring in a transfer, that may not always be the case.”
