Biggest takeaways from first Duke basketball scrimmage of summer workouts

The Duke basketball team has been on campus since last week for its summer workouts and the social media team has given the public an inside look at what has been going on in Durham.

After seeing each player go through individual drills on the first day of practice, the Blue Devils had its first intrasquad scrimmage that was later edited and published to YouTube.

The only caveat was that freshman guard Darren Harris was not participating in the game due to a broken non-shooting hand he suffered during the summer. He underwent surgery at Duke last Tuesday and is expected to make a full recovery.

"I like the competition," head coach Jon Scheyer said after the workout. "The competition can even go up. We'll get better and better."

"I'm excited to be your coach."

Duke has the top ranked freshmen recruiting class in the country, according to 247Sports, and the No. 22 transfer class in the nation. However, the Blue Devils are still considered as bringing the No. 1 class of new players into its program this offseason by the recruiting database.

Granted, it is only a late June scrimmage between players on the team but we take a look at some of the biggest takeaways from the 6-minute clip.

Cooper Flagg will be a defensive weapon

Much will be made about the offensive skillset that Cooper Flagg showed in the scrimmage, and rightly so. He's the presumpeive No. 1 pick in the 2025 NBA Draft and the top ranked recruit in the country.

People who don't normally watch Duke -- or the sport of college basketball until March -- are going to watch the Blue Devils this season just because of the young star. However, his defense was one of the biggest takeaways from the scrimmage.

Not that he did anything outstanding or had a major block, but that he will be guarding multiple positions this season. There were times he was guarding Caleb Foster, Sion James, or Maliq Brown.

There was no set defensive matchup for Cooper Flagg and that part of his game is very underrated given how special of a talent he is offensively. The expectation is that Duke will have a very strong defensive team this season and the versatility of Flagg will only add to that when the games count this winter.