Top-ranked Duke overcomes slow start to beat Georgetown
Pushed in a physical game, No. 1 Duke forged ahead with a second-half surge and held on to remain undefeated.
Cassius Stanley scored 20 of his 21 points in the second half while Tre Jones had 11 of his 13 after halftime as the Blue Devils topped Georgetown 81-73 in the 2K Empire Classic tournament championship game at Madison Square Garden.
No. 1 Duke (6-0), which trailed by as many as 11 points in the first half, built a 14-point second half lead and held on for the win.
Freshman center Vernon Carey scored 20 points with 10 rebounds for the Blue Devils. Freshman Wendell Moore scored 17 points on 7 of 10 shooting.
Omer Yurtseven, the former N.C. State center who transferred to Georgetown in 2018, led the Hoyas (4-2) with 21 points despite playing only 23 minutes due to foul trouble.
The teams were tied at 33 at halftime when the Blue Devils, with Jones leading the way, put together a half-opening charge to take the lead for good.
Georgetown had possession but Jones stole the in-bounds pass and sank a break-away layup. After a Yurtseven missed jumper, Jones drove through the defense for a layup in a half-court set.
Yurtseven missed another jumper and, in transition, Jones tossed a long pass to Carey who dunked in two points.
In less than a minute of the second half, Duke had scored six points to lead 39-33.
“He had his fingerprints on two baskets he made and then another one,” Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said. “In this game, getting six easy points, that was big.”
That was the start of Duke’s stellar second half of offense.
Three-pointers by Moore and Stanley gave Duke six made field goals on its first eight attempts and a 47-38 lead with 17:10 to play.
One minute later, Jones’ in-bounds pass under the basket to Stanley resulted in a basket for a 51-40 Duke lead.
A 7-2 Duke run, aided by Georgetown coach Patrick Ewing’s technical foul, pushed the Blue Devils’ lead to 68-55 with 8:53 to play.
Stanley’s 3-pointer with 4:59 to play gave Duke its largest lead at 77-63.
But the Blue Devils didn’t score for the next four minutes and 30 seconds while the Hoyas reeled off 10 consecutive points. Yurtseven’s basket with 1:21 left cut Duke’s lead to 77-71.
Carey missed two free throws with 49.7 left and James Akinjo sank two free throws with 42.2 to play leaving Duke with a four-point lead.
But Jones and Stanley each sank two free throws over the final 25.9 seconds to close the win out for the Blue Devils.
In the first half, Georgetown built a 29-18 lead on strong shooting, making 11 of its first 18 shots (including 4 of 6 3-pointers). But the Hoyas only sank one field goal the rest of the half, going six minutes without one, to allow Duke to come back and take a 33-31 lead when a Carey dunk gave the Blue Devils a 7-0 run.
And one
Duke continued its domination in rebounding, even against a Hoya team that featured 7-foot center Omer Yurtseven and 6-11 center Qudus Wahab backing him up. The Blue Devils won the rebounding battle 43-29. That’s five consecutive games Duke has outrebounded its opponent. The only game Duke lost the rebounding edge was its season-opening 68-66 win over Kansas.
Lane violation
Duke suffered through another slow start offensively. The Blue Devils were 4 of 17 from the field to start the game, going five minutes and 18 seconds without a made field goal. But after scoring 12 points in the game’s first 12 minutes, the Blue Devils heated up to close the first half and extended that strong play into the second half.
ICYMI
On a night when the officials were calling it close -- to be mild -- and fouls were aplenty, Georgetown coach Patrick Ewing finally had enough with 9:07 left in the game and Duke up 60-53. The Hoyas appeared to steal a Duke in-bound pass but Hoyas guard James Akinjo was called for a foul. Ewing stomped on to the court in protest and received a technical foul. He vehemently yelled at the officials with Hoyas assistant coach Louis Orr holding him back to keep him away from them.
Making sense of the numbers
5: Minutes played by freshman Matthew Hurt, who was healthy and in Duke’s starting lineup but used sparingly.
43.8: Duke’s field-goal shooting percentage in the second half. Duke was above the 50-percent mark for the half until missing its last five shots over the final 4:59.
52: Combined fouls called on both teams
This story was originally published November 22, 2019 at 9:49 PM with the headline "Top-ranked Duke overcomes slow start to beat Georgetown."