The second round of the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament is in the books, and the Duke Blue Devils are still alive. Duke was able to survive and advance, beating the tough Albany Great Danes, 73-61.
Duke vs. Albany: Seth Curry ‘stellar’ in March Madness win for Blue Devils
The Blue Devils moved on with a ho-hum victory over the Great Danes.
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In a game that remained somewhat tight but never truly in doubt, the Blue Devils were able to navigate themselves to a victory, earning a date with the Creighton Blue Jays of the Missouri Valley Conference on Sunday.
As pointed out on our Duke blog, Blue Vs. Blue, Seth Curry stepped up and kept the Blue Devils afloat at times with a stellar performance, writes Bart Matthews:
Seth was incredible. He saved our butts. 26 points on 10-14 shooting with 6 boards is just a stellar game. His pick up of a loose ball and subsequent layup when the Duke lead had been cut to 8 may very well have saved the game. Quinn ( 11 assists, 1 TO) was instrumental in Mason’s huge game ( 23 points and 8 boards on 9-11 shooting) and he may have hit the second biggest shot of the game with his shot-clock-expiring runner to put Duke up 10 late in the second half.
Matthews also pointed out the defensive effort by Duke, which can’t be completely told by the stats:
Though the numbers don’t look too bad ( Duke held the Great Danes to 61 points 36% shooting with 9 steals) the eyeball test tells us that the problems Duke has had containing dribble penetration remain unresolved. As Albany made their late second half run, it was deja vu all over again as the Devils found themselves out of position time and again, resulting in either easy twos or fouls.
All in all, Coach K has plenty to work on but yet has to be pleased in a tourney that has already seen a No. 2 and a No. 3 ousted in the Georgetown Hoyas and New Mexico Lobos, respectively.
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