Western Michigan 70, Duke 110

Well, I think we all knew this would be the outcome – a Duke blowout.

• I called the fact that the scoring would be balanced last night. 10 different Duke players scored last night. The only one who didn’t was Todd Zafirovski, which makes sense because he only saw two minutes of court time. He did make a field goal attempt though, which was cool. So I guess you could say that everyone at least attempted one shot.
• The three-point shooting was electrifying. 14 for 27 from beyond the arc, which is a ridiculous 51.9%.
• Three point stats: Ryan Kelly was 2 for 4, Seth Curry was 3 for 4, Tyler Thornton was 4 for 4, Austin Rivers was 2 for 4, and Michael Gbinije was 2 for 3.
• Duke also shot 54% from the field (34 for 63). That’s even more ridiculous than the three-point shooting.
• Quinn Cook had 16 points last night. It was great to see him get some valuable playing time and doing well.
• One thing I could complain about Duke (but don’t really need to): they had some very sloppy play, mostly in the second half, probably because they knew they were up by 40+ points. But it doesn’t matter. They could’ve been up by 60 points and I still would find it unacceptable to play sloppy basketball.
• The Western Michigan center, Matt Stainbrook, had 18 points and eight rebounds last night. But still, he was struggling to keep up with the speedy Duke offense and was a dangerous threat every time he touched the basketball most of the time. But, Stainbrook is 290 pounds and 6’9″. That’s about 30-35 pounds overweight for his height. At least he’s still out there scoring points and nabbing rebounds. I give him credit for that.
• I also give credit to the whole Western team. They were told by their head coach before the game to play aggressive basketball the whole game… he didn’t care if all of them fouled out or if they lost the game by 50 points, he wanted them to play aggressive and the team did that for the most part. Seven Western players had at least three fouls in the game.
• One more thing I’d like to give credit to Western for: they never quit. Sure, they were down by almost 50 points at one point and ended up losing by 40, but their emotions never got to them and they continued to try their best and do the maximum they could out of Duke’s defense.
• Next game for Duke is tomorrow at 5:00 PM EST against Penn, an Ivy League team. Let’s Go Devils!