The typical embarrassing January loss has been suffered by the Duke basketball program.
Seemingly every season the Duke basketball team is stunned at the hands of an unranked opponent in January, and the 2021-22 season is no different.
In its second game after a two-week pause, in which the No. 2 Blue Devils (12-2, 2-1 ACC) did not look great in their first game back, Duke hosted the surging Miami Hurricanes (13-3, 5-0 ACC), who entered Cameron Indoor Stadium with a lot of confidence.
The confidence from the ‘Canes was evident as the two teams traded buckets throughout the game, but everything went downhill for the Blue Devils after Paolo Banchero gave the team a three-point lead, 74-71, with 44.9 seconds to play.
Banchero put together a sequence of four points, one block, and one steal to tilt the final minute heavily in the favor of Duke, but a foul on the other end by Jeremy Roach, as Charlie Moore converted the layup, gave Miami a chance to tie the game at the free throw line.
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Moore missed the free throw. But the Hurricanes, without Duke center Mark Williams in the game, were able to get the offensive rebound.
Kameron McGusty was able to break down the Blue Devil defensive once again for a layup that put Miami back on top, and the Duke offense, with no timeouts left, was unable to get a good look at the basket.
Trevor Keels missed a free throw line jumper with 11.2 seconds left to play as Isaiah Wong grabbed the defensive rebound and split his pair of free throws, putting Miami up 76-74.
However, Wendell Moore took an ill-advised transition 3-pointer with three seconds left, and Keels was unable to get the game-winning triple to go with 0.7 seconds left as Miami left Durham with a massive upset victory, 76-74.
Duke basketball still has a lot to figure out
The Blue Devils are nowhere close to the team that left the floor against Virginia Tech on December 22 and still have a lot of work to do to get back to that version of themselves this season.
Jeremy Roach and Trevor Keels were a combined 5-of-19 from the floor for 18 points.
AJ Griffin was the only player to get significant minutes off the bench as Joey Baker and Theo John combined for nine minutes for the Blue Devils.
Duke turned the ball over 17 times, which resulted in 17 points for Miami.
Paolo Banchero needed the ball more, specifically in the final 30 seconds. The freshman was 6-of-10 from the field and 6-of-7 from the free throw line with 20 points and seven rebounds.
The Blue Devils will try and correct things in their first conference road game on Wednesday night against Wake Forest (13-3, 3-2 ACC).