Cooper Flagg remains the biggest bright spot around the Duke basketball program but its recent games have shown there are still questions involving the supporting cast despite its unblemished conference record.
Tyrese Proctor, expected to be a star guard for the Blue Devils, has hit a major slump in his junior season after posting single digit scoring totals in four of his last five games.
Most recently Proctor had just four points in Duke’s 74-64 win over NC State and six points when the Blue Devils picked up a road comeback victory against Wake Forest. In those two games, he is 3-of-18 from the field and 1-of-9 from 3-point range.
A 20-point outing against Boston College appeared to be an anomaly after that came following a 3-point outing against Notre Dame and scoreless showing in the win over Miami.
He is 4-of-28 from the field in those four games and previously had just three single digit scoring games this season – two coming against mid-major teams in blowout victories – in the first 15 games of the year and Duke must get him back on track quickly.
Proctor’s returning backcourt running mate, Caleb Foster, has also been a major disappointment thus far in the season and just posted back-to-back scoreless games in Duke’s most recent wins.
He has not shown the growth that anyone expected out of him this season and now has gone scoreless in five games this season after having just two such games as a freshman.
Foster has been unplayable in crunch time and spending most of the game on the bench in critical situations. Expected to be a key contributor from the outside this season, Foster has made just 30-percent of his attempts (15-of-50) after connecting on 40.6-percent (28-of-69) a year ago.
It’s getting to the point of the season where Duke might not be able to rely on Caleb Foster for a major impact.
The same can be said for freshman Isaiah Evans, who has proven to be an electric 3-point shooter when given the opportunity to play on the court but logged only seven total minutes in the last two games and did not score in either.
When playing at least ten minutes in a game this season Evans has scored in double figures five times and his scoring ability would take a major weight off the shoulders of Flagg and Kon Knueppel.
Duke is still in complete control of its destiny for an ACC regular season championship and No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament but there are still areas to improve upon as the calendar turns to February.
The No. 2 Blue Devils (18-2, 10-0 ACC) will host struggling North Carolina (13-9, 6-4 ACC) on Saturday night (6:30 p.m. ET, ESPN).