Stock Up, Stock Down: Duke cruises to easy victory over Virginia Tech

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Duke basketball forward Matthew Hurt (Photo by Grant Halverson/Getty Images) /

The Duke basketball team picked up a much-needed victory on Saturday night against the Virginia Tech Hokies following a blowout loss earlier in the week.

Coming off the blowout loss, Duke needed to get back on its feet and it did in a major way.

The Blue Devils won the opening tipoff against Virginia Tech and never looked back after Tre Jones drilled a 3-pointer to start the game, winning 88-64.

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Virginia Tech never got within three points of the Blue Devils following that shot and Duke led by as many as 30 points in its victory.

Duke had one of its worst shooting performances of the season on Wednesday night against North Carolina State, but the Blue Devils responded with an excellent showing in Cameron Indoor Stadium.

Mike Krzyzewski‘s squad was 27-of-62, 43.5 percent, from the field and 11-of-26, 42.3 percent, from 3-point territory.

In its mid-week loss Duke also had serious issues from the free throw line but the Blue Devils were able to correct that by going 23-of-31, 74.2 percent, from the charity stripe.

In its 24-point victory, the Duke defense was only able to force eight turnovers from the Hokies but Virginia Tech was only able to shoot 37.3 percent from the floor and 33.3 percent from 3-point range.

The Blue Devils only allowed Mike Young‘s team to shoot seven free throws in the game but dominated Virginia Tech on the backboards winning the rebounding battle, 49-31, with an overwhelming 14 offensive rebounds.

Landers Nolley, the Hokies leading scorer, was limited to just three points on 1-of-8 shooting in just 16 minutes and in his two games against the Blue Devils he has ten combined points on four-of-15 shooting.

Duke picked up a win it desperately needed and will try to keep things rolling to close out the regular season in the two weeks prior to the ACC Tournament.

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