Duke basketball: Tre Jones does what only Bobby Hurley could do

At Michigan State, the Duke basketball team benefited from a box-score feat no other Blue Devil has matched ever since arguably the program’s all-time greatest point guard was in school.

Duke basketball sophomore Tre Jones is dishing out the exact number of assists per game this season (7.4) that Bobby Hurley averaged for his entire second season (1990-91), which ended in the program’s first national championship.

Hurley, who averaged no less than seven dimes per game for any of his four campaigns and whose No. 11 adorns Cameron Indoor Stadium’s rafters, remains the NCAA’s all-time assists leader with 1,076 — a mark Jones likely wouldn’t reach even if he was to stay in college through his senior year.

ALSO READ: Hall of Fame overlooks Blue Devils, Tar Heels

After all, between last season and the Blue Devils’ 8-1 start this season, Jones has 259 assists, 29 fewer than Hurley tallied just as a freshman alone. However, in terms of single-game feats, Jones is already giving Hurley some company on two elite lists.

In orchestrating No. 10 Duke’s 87-75 stomping of No. 11 Michigan State (now 5-3) in East Lansing on Tuesday night, Jones became the only Blue Devil other than Hurley to have piled up 20 points and 10 assists for a game on an opponent’s court.

ALSO READ: Duke makes a statement by rolling over Michigan State

To be exact, in avenging the Blue Devils’ season-ending loss to the Spartans back in March, Jones wound up with 20 points and 12 assists, making the 6-foot-3, 185-pound Minnesota native the first Blue Devil to have ever reached both those marks in a road game.

Also, Jones became only the third Blue Devil to have done so either home or away. Jones tied the totals of Tate Armstrong for both points and assists from Dec. 3, 1975, at home against Tennessee (Duke lost, 86-80).

And though Jones came up short of Hurley’s 23 points and 15 assists from Duke’s 88-84 win at home over Oklahoma on Jan. 4, 1993 — ironically, like the Spartans on Tuesday night, the Sooners held a No. 11 ranking at the time of that game — Hurley had the benefit of overtime and of being a senior.

Program records aside, Jones — whose scoring average is now up to 15.7 — was a special sight against Sparty. He manufactured all types of buckets (6-for-13 from the field, 2-for-5 from deep, and 6-for-8 from the charity stripe). He delivered fastbreak alley-oops, thread-the-needle bounce passes, and perfectly placed lobs to Vernon Carey Jr. when the freshman center rolled to the basket.

As a bonus, the defense Jones put on display was magnificent: three steals, one block, and headaches galore for Michigan State’s starting backcourt duo of Cassius Winston and Rocket Watts, who finished a combined 5-for-21 from the field.

ALSO READ: Top five defensive teams at Duke under Coach K

Jones, who wears No. 3, is obviously not Hurley. But what Jones is — a pass-first floor general with a remarkable competitive fire — makes him arguably the Blue Devil who has resembled Hurley the most ever since the final time No. 11 appeared on a Duke basketball jersey.

The next Duke basketball game is another road test: on Friday at 7 p.m. (ACCN) at Virginia Tech, a squad that is now 6-2 (1-0 ACC) after dropping two straight (by double digits to both Dayton and BYU) ever since knocking off Michigan State in Maui last week.

Stay tuned to Ball Durham for more updates, analyses, opinions, and predictions regarding the 2019-20 Duke basketball season.