Justin Champagnie struggled from deep last season as a freshman, knocking down only 33 of his 126 3-point attempts (26.2 percent), but he managed to average 12.7 points per game. In his only performance against the Blue Devils last season, the 6-foot-6, 200-pound combo guard was held to 13 points on 5-of-12 shooting in Durham. However, he pulled down seven rebounds, which was his average on the season as well.
Duke relied heavily on backcourt defensive specialist Tre Jones to slow down Champagnie. Without Jones, the Blue Devils may have to look to senior Jordan Goldwire, freshman DJ Steward, or freshman Jeremy Roach, all 6-foot-3 or shorter, to guard the Panthers’ returning leading scorer and rebounder.
Now, we will detour out west to look at the Fighting Irish…