NEWARK, N.J. — Duke basketball was 364 days removed from a loss in the Elite Eight to rival North Carolina State.
Most programs would find joy in an Elite Eight run. Not the Blue Devils. That doesn’t live up to the high bar set by their previous coach.
“When we were in the bathroom last year after we lost and I told Coach (Jon Scheyer) I was coming back, we both had a vision,” junior guard Tyrese Proctor said, “and I think just the way we executed and doubled down … I think it shows a lot of resiliency.”
The Blue Devils helped themselves to a top-rated freshman class, and they’ve proceeded to steamroll their way back to the Final Four.
Kon Knueppel had a game-high 21 points with five assists, Cooper Flagg added 16 points and nine rebounds, and No. 1 seed Duke defeated No. 2 Alabama 85-65 to win the NCAA Tournament East Region final on Saturday night.
Duke (35-3) made its 18th Final Four in program history and its first since Scheyer took over for the retired Mike Krzyzewski. The Blue Devils will face either Houston or Tennessee, who will square off in the Midwest Region final on Sunday.
Proctor scored 17 points on 7-of-10 shooting and Khaman Maluach had 14 points, nine rebounds and five dunks for the Blue Devils. They outshot the Crimson Tide 53.6 percent to 35.4 percent from the field while bottling up an Alabama team that made an NCAA Tournament record 25 3-pointers in the Sweet 16.
Flagg, the presumptive No. 1 selection in this June’s NBA draft, made just 6 of 16 shots from the floor but was buoyed by Knueppel and Maluach — also projected lottery picks.
“Each night could be somebody else’s night,” Flagg said. “I think tonight Kon kind of stepped up and had the ball a lot. We ran a lot of actions for him. Tyrese was huge for us.”
Flagg drained a 3-pointer 19 seconds into the game. Duke never surrendered the lead from there.
Alabama (28-9) cut it to 65-58 with 8:03 to play before hitting a scoring drought lasting longer than five minutes. Flagg scored a baseline jumper over Mark Sears to prompt a 13-0 Duke run.
On consecutive possessions, Duke got Sears to travel, then drew an offensive foul off Sears’ elbow. Sears, who knocked down 10 treys in a 34-point showing against BYU on Thursday, finished 2-for-12 from the field for six points with six assists and five turnovers.
Labaron Philon led the Crimson Tide with 16 points, and Grant Nelson and Chris Youngblood each had 10.
“I thought once they went to switching the ball screens, we just weren’t very good,” said coach Nate Oats, who was aiming to take Alabama to its second straight Final Four. “They switched and we kind of went to iso ball. That’s not how we play.”
Down 15-5 early on, Alabama freshman big man Aiden Sherrell knocked down consecutive triples. Soon the Tide drew within 21-17 before missing 11 of their next 12 shots.
Sears started 0-for-3, including an ill-advised layup that Maluach swatted out of play.
“When we would drive, they would build out, and they had a great rim protector at the rim making it hard on us, and they just did a really good job of doing that,” Sears said.
Flagg converted a three-point play with 16 seconds left, but Sears set up Nelson for a buzzer-beating layup to make it 46-37 Duke at the half.
Duke’s lead vacillated between seven and 11 points for much of the second half, and Proctor made consecutive layups for 63-50 lead with roughly 10 minutes to go.
The Blue Devils shot at least 50 percent from the floor for the fourth straight tournament game. They also outrebounded Alabama by 10 in the second half (11 overall), nixing nearly every chance Alabama had to ignite a comeback.
Scheyer was thoroughly impressed with how far his team had come.
“I don’t want to call Elite Eight a failure. Elite Eight is a special thing to be in this game,” Scheyer said. “… A lot of our focus in preseason, summer, during the year has been about winning the mental game, winning the preparation, winning the energy you put into these moments.”
–Adam Zielonka, Field Level Media
