Duke Basketball: Each Blue Devils Starter's Most Impressive Stat

The most impressive stat regarding Duke basketball was zero until North Carolina State went and crashed the party in Sunday’s game.

The Wolfpack handed the Blue Devils their first loss of the season and ended any unrealistic undefeated dreams for Mike Krzyzewski’s squad. Now all the Blue Devils have left to play for is an ACC title and a national championship.

Something tells me they will muster up the proper motivation.

Duke’s most difficult stretch of the regular season is on the immediate horizon with road games against Louisville, St. John’s, Notre Dame and Virginia all within the next 18 days. However, it is worth looking back on the team’s formidable start before looking ahead.

With that in mind, here is a look at the most impressive stat for each Duke starter.

*Important note: All stats are through the North Carolina State game and do not include Tuesday’s Miami game.

Quinn Cook: 97 percent from the free-throw line

Lance King/Getty Images

The consternation about Quinn Cook losing his starting job before the season started because of the influx of freshmen seems like years ago now.

The senior leader has stepped up in a number of different areas, but the most impressive stat on his resume is a 97 percent clip from the free-throw line.

Cook’s free-throw shooting has been overlooked in light of his nearly 15 points a game, but a team that is as talented as Duke is going to have to sink free throws down the stretch because it is almost always winning.

Cook has done a masterful job of doing just that, which should not come as a surprise considering his senior leadership status.

Tyus Jones: 3.4-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio

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The Blue Devils have NBA prospects across the board, and Tyus Jones’ main job as a freshman point guard is to distribute the ball to that talent. The fact that he is only a freshman makes his 3.4-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio all the more impressive.

He has a stoic demeanor on the floor that helps calm his team down in tight games and set the tone on the offensive side of the ball. He also had the right attitude after his first collegiate loss, via C.L. Brown of ESPN.com: “We all have a job regardless of class, we’ve got to come ready to play. We’re going to look at this and learn from it, regroup and try to get one on Tuesday.” 

Freshman or not, Jones has set the tone for the offense and his teammates like a four-year veteran. If he can keep doing that, the Blue Devils could cut down the nets at the end of the season.

Justise Winslow: 6’10” wingspan (per DraftExpress)

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It is admittedly something of a cop-out to put Justise Winslow’s wingspan on here instead of a specific statistic since none of his stats jump off the page, but this is the most important characteristic of his game.

Winslow is a prototypical 6'6" small forward, but the combination of his athleticism and 6’10” wingspan makes it almost impossible to drive past him on the dribble. He has nearly single-handedly turned the Blue Devils’ perimeter defense from a crippling weakness into an occasional strength, and he contributes on the boards as well (five rebounds per game).

His big-man-like wingspan on the perimeter helps in a number of ways, from the perimeter defense to rebounding to finishing at the rim over the top of outstretched arms from the opponent’s rim protectors. 

It has also likely caught the eyes of NBA scouts.

Amile Jefferson: 7.4 rebounds per game

Ellen Ozier/Associated Press

For all the attention that Jahlil Okafor has rightly received down low, he is not the only Duke big man who has impressed on the boards.

Amile Jefferson is playing consistent, albeit overlooked, basketball alongside the future first-round NBA draft pick, and the most impressive thing he has done this year is help control the glass. In fact, Jefferson’s 7.4 rebounds per game look even better when you consider that he only plays 22.6 minutes a night.

That means he would be grabbing just over 13 boards a game if he played the entire 40 minutes. 

Duke’s biggest weakness outside of perimeter defense last year was rebounding and controlling the paint. That is no longer a concern with both Okafor and Jefferson down low.

Jahlil Okafor: 19.2 points per game on 68.4 percent shooting from the field

Ellen Ozier/Associated Press

Okafor is possibly the next No. 1 pick in the NBA draft, and he stuffs the stat sheet with a number of impressive statistics.

However, his scoring totals (19.2 points per game) and the efficiency with which he puts up those numbers (68.4 percent shooting from the field) are the most important parts of the package he brings to the table for Duke. The offense runs through him, which leads to easy baskets down low or wide-open three-pointers when the defense collapses.

That wouldn’t be possible if he wasn’t so consistent in the scoring department. 

ESPN Stats & Info put into context just how effective Okafor has been this season putting the ball through the basket:

Soon enough, we will be asking if Okafor can score at this rate when he is in the NBA.

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