Lack of perimeter depth means new look for Duke ‘D’

Thu, Oct 22, 2009

DURHAM, N.C. – This is the fourth time the Duke Blue Devils have gathered to officially prepare for the 2009-10 basketball season. It says so right there on the practice plan, which was drawn up by Mike Krzyzewski himself this very morning. So it just seems, well, weird that nearly a half an hour of this session is being devoted to deploying the team in a couple of different zone defenses.

This is Cameron Indoor Stadium, where so many of the banners were hung by pressure man-to-man. This is Duke, which has built nearly three decades of excellence on denying the wings.

Mike Krzyzewski says this Duke team won’t play as much pressure man-to-man defense as in years past.
This is a team, however, with two 6-10 guys along the baseline (Miles and Mason Plumlee), a 6-8 small forward (Kyle Singler) and a 6-5 point guard (Jon Scheyer). The only comparatively little guy is 6-2 shooting guard Nolan Smith.

“We’ve never had this big of a team with a limited number of perimeter players,” Krzyzewski said. “We can’t be foolish and try to fit this group into a system that’s not conducive to their talents.”

When Smith signed at Duke, he never would have imagined spending that much time on zone that early in the process. When he opened last season as the team’s first-string point guard, Smith said, “I was expected to pick up full, pressure the ball.”

You won’t see much of that now. Duke has only one recruited scholarship player, freshman …