Unpredictable Duke Blue Devils Will Be Dangerous in NCAA Tournament

BROOKLYN, New York — Just six days ago, Harry Giles stepped to the free-throw line in front of a crowd clad in Carolina Blue and heard a chant. North Carolina head coach Roy Williams tried to hush his faithful, but by then, the damage was done. 

All Blue Devils must endure—and are trained to ignore—the taunts of opposing crowds, but Giles couldn't tune out 20,000 fans in the Dean Smith Center that night. And once he let those words seep in—"Overrated! Overrated!"—he couldn't forget them.       

"That was my motivation coming into the game," Giles said after Friday night's rematch at the Barclays Center. "Normally I just let that be noise, but it was kind of hard to ignore all of them. I had to prove them wrong instead."

On Friday, in a rare Round 3 of college basketball's greatest rivalry—Duke and UNC have met just once in the ACC tournament since Williams took over the Tar Heels in 2003-04—Giles set out to correct the record about him.

In a sequence sure to loop repeatedly in tournament highlights for the next several weeks, he blocked a shot by North Carolina star and ACC Player of the Year Justin Jackson and then raced back down the court to catch a pass from Grayson Allen midair and flush the alley-oop.

And although his final box score doesn't read like a potential top-five pick in the 2017 NBA draft—he finished with six points, seven rebounds and four blocks in 15 minutes of Duke's 93-83 win—he flashed the kind of athleticism that had propelled him to the status of No. 1 recruit in the nation at his position.

In many ways, Giles' story mirrors his team's. Duke was the consensus preseason No. 1 team in the country—there were even whispers of a potential 40-0 season. Instead, this Blue Devils squad has largely fallen short of expectations. It opened ACC play 3-4 and closed it losing three of four games. It's had to overcome not only outside expectations but suspensions and injuries (including to head coach Mike Krzyzewski).    

Now, having knocked out Clemson, Louisville and North Carolina in consecutive days, it's tempting to think that Duke—and Giles—has finally found its way.

Indeed, that's how those in the Blue Devils locker room are beginning to feel.

"I think it's been happening everywhere—in games, in practice, how we travel, how we carry ourselves," senior forward and team captain Amile Jefferson said. "We're becoming a team. We're bonding. We're becoming pure. To do something special, you have to be pure. We're doing just that.

"We're fighting together. We're relying on all our guys. We're sharing the ball and sharing emotions. We're being tough together. Those are the kind of things that make you a quality and really good team."

Julie Jacobson/Associated Press

It's hard to say these Blue Devils are "back," although that will be a popular sentiment—especially if they go on to win the ACC tournament by beating Notre Dame on Saturday night. This team has been mercurial and unpredictable all season.

Although the lineups have evolved, this is fundamentally the same team that lost to North Carolina State at home. And it's the same one that beat Virginia on the road. It's the one that looked outgunned and outmanned against North Carolina in the first half Friday night and came back to trounce the Tar Heels in the second.

Although it's enviable on paper that Duke can bring 5-star players such as Chase Jeter and Marques Bolden off the bench, it's difficult to imagine anybody outside of the Blue Devils' top seven saving the team in a close NCAA tournament contest.

Instead, in the Big Dance, Duke will rely—as it has all season and in the tournament—on stalwarts like leading scorer Luke Kennard and third-leading scorer Grayson Allen, on leaders like Jefferson and on Jayson Tatum, the freshman who has shone almost all year.

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"We've gotten better here," Krzyzewski said. "That's the main thing. We've gotten to know each other better. Playing against a team that's really desperate in Clemson and two teams that could win the national championship in Louisville and North Carolina, just so opportunistic for us. And what everyone was saying about this bracket or that bracket, we just said we've got a chance if we can keep winning with a chance to play against the best in the conference. It's been the best."

Duke may never reach its full potential, but that's OK. After all, the Blue Devils are trying to become the first program to ever win four games in four days to become ACC tournament champions.

But this squad has bigger goals. It's trying to be the Jekyll to its own Hyde and prove a nation of detractors wrong by cutting down the nets April 3 in Phoenix.

The Blue Devils are talented enough to do just that. That's the team they've been all along.

Whether they reach that goal will ultimately define their season. But no matter what happens during the NCAA tournament, it's bound to be unforgettable.

All quotes obtained firsthand and star rankings courtesy of Scout.