Duke basketball sees snubs in national preseason honors

Members of the Duke basketball program were snubbed from national preseason honors.

As various media outlets, organizations, and conferences hand out preseason honors, college basketball season inches closer, and the Duke basketball program is no stranger to seeing its players on those lists.

However, the Blue Devils also saw some snubs on preseason honors lists.

Duke, ranked as the preseason No. 2 team in the ACC, only trails Virginia as the Cavaliers brought in 97 first-place votes and the Blue Devils with 34 votes.

Freshman standout Jalen Johnson was the only Blue Devil named to the Preseason All-ACC First Team as sophomore Wendell Moore was named to the Second Team.

Moore also received seven votes to be the ACC Preseason Player of the Year, and fellow sophomore Matthew Hurt also received three votes, but North Carolina’s Garrison Brooks was the runaway winner as the Preseason Player of the Year.

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Johnson came in second in the ACC Preseason Freshman of the Year voting behind Florida State’s Scottie Barnes while DJ Steward, Jeremy Roach, and Mark Williams all received votes for the Preseason Freshman of the Year.

Duke also saw a handful of its players named to their respective positional award’s watch list as Johnson and Moore, both small forwards, were named to the Julius Erving Award Watch List, given to the best small forward in the country.

Freshmen DJ Steward, a shooting guard, was named to the Jerry West Award Watch List, and center Mark Williams was named to the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Watch List.

Power forward Matthew Hurt was also named to the Karl Malone Award Watch List as he enters his second season in Durham.

Snubs from the Duke basketball program

One significant absence from the positional award watch lists was Duke freshman point guard Jeremy Roach, who was not named as one of the 20 point guards on the Bob Cousy Award Watch List.

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Hurt was also snubbed from being named to the Preseason All-ACC Second Team despite garnering votes as the Preseason Player of the Year.

The Blue Devils will look to utilize their depth and athleticism to catapult themselves to a sixth National Championship for the program as their regular season begins in Durham on November 25.