How Amile Jefferson's Injury Impacts Duke in 2015-16

It was five years ago that Duke lost a key contributor to injury at this point in the season yet still managed to win 32 games and earn a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament.

The difference between that team and this year's group is the Blue Devils don't appear as equipped to handle the loss of Amile Jefferson nearly as well as they did when Kyrie Irving was hurt in December 2010.

The school announced on Monday that Jefferson, a 6'9" senior forward in the midst of his best season, is out indefinitely after suffering a right foot injury. He was averaging 11.4 points and a team-high 10.3 rebounds per game on 68.3 percent shooting, starting all nine contests as part of an all-senior frontcourt with center Marshall Plumlee.

"This injury is unfortunate, to say the least," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said, per CBSSports.com's Chip Patterson.

Coach K's quote had a double meaning, as it went on to describe how hard Jefferson will work to recover from the injury.

But in addition to his loyal veteran—whom he pulled from the starting lineup late last season to improve the offense—getting a raw deal, a Duke team that hoped to have depth in the frontcourt heading into 2015-16 now is perilously thin in the paint.

Few preseason projections had Jefferson and Plumlee as much more than role players, let alone full-time starters. Well-regarded freshman Chase Jeter and Rice transfer Sean Obi figured to be heavily involved in the playing rotation, while freshman wing Brandon Ingram was a candidate to have a role similar to Justise Winslow's last season at the 4.

Instead, Ingram has showed he's best fit to play the 3 until he can put more weight on his 6'9", 190-pound frame, while Jeter has seen limited action and Obi has hardly played.

Jefferson was playing 30.3 minutes per game, while Plumlee—a career backup—has logged 25 minutes per game but tended to need a lot of breaks. Laura Keeley of the News & Observer tweeted:

Plumlee won't be the only person seeing more minutes. Keeley wrote that Jefferson's injury should cause Duke to go to a three-guard lineup, with Ingram moving to the 4 and freshman Derryck Thornton joining junior Matt Jones and sophomore Grayson Allen in the backcourt.

That's a similar position makeup to the unit Duke went with down the stretch in 2014-15 en route to winning the national title, though it had the luxury of turning to Jefferson and Plumlee for valuable minutes off the bench. It also could rely on freshman Jahlil Okafor to be a major rim protector while Winslow was a monster on the defensive end—something this lineup doesn't figure to have.

Keeley wrote that the projected lineup is "less than ideal defensively, given Ingram’s slender frame, but he will present issues for opposing power forwards on the perimeter."

Though he was averaging a career high in points, Jefferson's main value this season had been on the boards. Of his 93 rebounds, 43 were of the offensive variety, accounting for 34 percent of Duke's offensive rebounds. Plumlee, Ingram and Jones, the next three best offensive rebounders, have 43 combined.

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Jeter, rated by 247Sports as the No. 15 player in the 2015 recruiting class, has played in seven of nine games for a total of 57 minutes. He's averaging 2.7 points and 2.1 rebounds and has committed 10 fouls, showing only brief flashes of promise while otherwise looking unready to contribute.

Obi, whose 6'9", 250-pound frame spent all of last season practicing against Okafor while sitting out the year, has been a major bust. He averaged 11.4 points and 9.3 rebounds as a freshman at Rice in 2013-14 but has played a mere five minutes in two games with the Blue Devils.

Duke's first game without Jefferson comes on Tuesday at home against Georgia Southern. The Eagles (3-4) start four guards and have no players taller than 6'8" on the roster, so Jefferson's absence won't be felt as much as on Saturday against Utah and 7'0" sophomore Jakob Poeltl in New York City.

Once the schedule turns over to ACC play in January, several more formidable frontcourts will pop up.

Eight teams in the league entered Monday ranked among the top 40 teams in the country in rebounding margin, the first of which on Duke's slate will be Virginia Tech on Jan. 9. The Hokies have a plus-9.6 margin, while Duke sits at plus-6.6 thanks to Jefferson.

Irving injured a toe eight games into his lone season with Duke in 2010-11, returning in time for the NCAA tournament. 

In his absence, senior Nolan Smith took over the point guard duties while sophomores Seth Curry and Andre Dawkins increased their production to make the change a relatively painless one. The team advanced as far as the Sweet Sixteen, finishing 32-5.

The Blue Devils can only hope the same happens while waiting for Jefferson to return.

Follow Brian J. Pedersen on Twitter at @realBJP.