Duke basketball doesn't play great but has plenty to beat Notre Dame

The Duke basketball team was looking for a bounce back victory against Notre Dame on Wednesday night after its loss to North Carolina and it got it, although it wasn't very pretty.

Jon Scheyer's team started the game on a 20-5 run over the opening 10 minutes and looked like a group of players who were foaming at the mouth to rectify its play after on Saturday night.

Complacency started to settle in and the Fighting Irish kept hanging around, but it never felt like the Blue Devils were in danger of losing its lead.

Duke pulled ahead by as many as 19 points, 63-44, in the second half before closing out the 71-53 victory.

The offense was not particularly strong, depsite Notre Dame's strong defensive statistics, shooting 43.3-percent from the field yet just 22.2-percent on 3-point shots and 60.0-percent from the free throw line.

Caleb Foster and Mark Mitchell led the team with 13 points each and Jared McCain was the only other player in double figures with 11 points.

Kyle Filipowski didn't look like himself whatsoever with just eight points on 2-of-9 shooting and not only needs to be more efficient, but looked more engaged while he's on the floor in order for the Blue Devils to reach its potential.

Tyrese Proctor didn't have the bounce back game many were expecting after his rough performance against the Tar Heels with nine points on 3-of-7 shooting, 1-of-5 from 3-point range, while it was a rare off night from Jeremy Roach with seven points on 3-of-10 shooting, also hitting just 1-of-5 shots from distance.

Notre Dame's (7-16, 2-10 ACC) defense was strong in the first matchup of the season between the two teams too, holding Duke to only 35.6-percent shooting and 67 points.

However, the Blue Devil defense stifled a offensively challenged Notre Dame team to just 33.9-percent shooting and 25.9-percent from 3-point range as the Irish failed to score more than 28 points in either half.

No. 9 Duke (17-5, 8-3 ACC) will continue its home stand on Saturday, February 10 (2:00 p.m. ET, ESPN) against Boston College (13-9, 4-7 ACC).