Once again, the Duke basketball team will be entering the season with a very young roster.
A season removed from making the Final Four led by a generational rookie in Cooper Flagg, Jon Scheyer is hoping for some of the same magic this winter but there is a major difference in his roster construction from last season.
While Flagg was joined by a talented recruiting class of Kon Knueppel, Khaman Maluach, and others, the Blue Devils had a major veteran presence in junior guard Tyrese Proctor and transfer portal additions Sion James and Mason Gillis.
This year that is not the case.
Duke did not make any notable additions in the portal and instead attacked the offseason with a focus of retaining players from its roster and did so successfully.
Jon Scheyer’s program was one of just a handful of schools not to see a scholarship player enter the transfer portal and while the Blue Devils will be bringing some experience back to its roster, it is mostly players who had ups-and-downs, last season and still have not experienced the big moment.
Caleb Foster will be the most experienced player for Duke and he has been through a wild ride during his tenure in Durham. After a promising freshman season, Foster was injured late in the regular season and forced to miss the ACC and NCAA Tournament.
He was expected to be a major contributor during his sophomore season and after beginning the year as a starter, he was relegated to a reverse role on the bench until the postseason where he started to flash some of his potential.
Now, Duke will be relying on him not only to stay healthy but maintain a high level of play through the duration of the season.
The same can be said for sophomores Isaiah Evans and Patrick Ngongba, who showed moments of high-level play during their freshmen season but were not on the floor during the critical moments.
Like always, a lot of pressure will be put on the shoulders of Duke’s talented freshmen, specifically Cameron Boozer, who will be looking to fill the shoes of the presumptive No. 1 overall pick in Cooper Flagg.
It’s very unlikely that the Blue Devils will operate at the same efficiency as last season, which was one of the best in the KenPom era, but that’s not to say they will not, or could not, be an elite team. It just might take a little bit longer for everyone to get on the same page.