Preview: Duke vs. Virginia: Nothing's Gotta Give

Duke is a team that likes to spread the floor and drive and kick. 

They’re an uptempo club that is more comfortable shooting an open three than a close, contested two.

They lack a major big man up front, who can take over when the three fails to fall—and, of course, their coach does an excellent job preparing his troops.

Now, return to the first paragraph and replace Duke with Virginia. 

These teams are mirror images of one another, except Duke’s better.  (Think about THAT for a second.)  Nationally, Duke is ranked higher  in defensive efficiency—a top-ten placement for the Blue Devils here, and in offensive efficiency, and three-point shooting percentage, and two-point shooting percentage, and...I could go on. 

Virginia is tops in defensive boards—second in the nation, actually.  But hey, you can’t be good at everything.

It’s a little bit like Joey Chestnut challenging Mark Mangino to a grilled cheese eating competition.  One’s a proven winner with a track record, the other one just looks like he should be good at it.

Although on paper it appears Virginia lacks a chance to win, that’s just not the case with these Cavaliers.  First of all, the games aren’t played on paper.  That would create a huge mess, increase the risk of injury to the players, and generally would not be very eco-friendly. 

Second, Virginia shoots a plethora of threes—a full 40 percent of their field goal attempts come from downtown.*  Shooting a lot of threes and knocking down a fair bit of them gives Virginia the opportunity to beat anyone at any time. They're certainly good enough from beyond the arc to beat this Duke crew (not to be confused with Duke Crews). 

Furthermore, the Cavs have had 10 full days of rest and practice to prepare for this contest—which is always good for the legs of a jump-shooting team.

However, they must—simply must—play better defense.  As noted on this here cyber-space previously, giving up a 62 percent clip from three is a death sentence, especially in your ACC opener.

If Virginia fails to shoot well from three and plays shoddy D, then the Virginia-Duke tilt might get as messy as the aforementioned grilled-cheese eating contest.  (And it sure won't help them that Mike Krzyzewski never forgets.)

 (All stats courtesy of kenpom.com.)

* Note: Why is the three-point field goal area nicknamed downtown?  Shouldn’t downtown be the area closest to the basket?  This has never made any sense to me.