Blue Devils space floor to exploit Pitt’s defense

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Before an official handed the ball to Duke forward Rodney Hood for an in-bounds pass late in the second half, the referee asked Pitt freshman forward Michael Young to take a step back, to give Hood more space.

By then, Pitt’s hopes of overcoming a double-digit deficit were draining, as were the majority of the shots the Blue Devils had taken throughout the contest, but Young backed off, anyway. The rules say he had to. Or maybe he stepped back because he was used to the move — the Panthers were allowing that kind of breathing room all night.

Duke created the offensive space necessary to shoot 13-of-25 from 3-point range and 48 percent from the field, lifting the 17th-ranked Blue Devils to a 80-65 win against the 18th-ranked Panthers Monday night at the Petersen Events Center.

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said the formula for opening the court to allow for the Blue Devils’ uncontested looks was just patience and a bit of penetration. 

Pitt coach Jamie Dixon agreed.

“Our breakdowns were often, early and continued throughout the second half,” Dixon said. “I don’t want to take away from [Duke] because they made the shots and they had the patience, but we simply put ourselves in a hole by not being able to get shots.”

Krzyzewski broke down the recipe a bit more specifically than those two ingredients.

“Rasheed [Sulaimon’s] penetration helped,” Krzyzewski said. “Quinn [Cook] … penetrated on a couple plays that he made with Amile [Jefferson], to go along with what Andre [Dawkins] was doing, gave us that margin.”

Krzyzewski named four of his players who perfected the recipe. But he made the beneficiary of the masterful spacing, Dawkins, a senior guard, seem like an afterthought. Yet Dawkins was anything but, usually the one to cap a clinic on ball movement with a clean-looking 3-point jumper.

“Andre, we got some looks for him,” Krzyzewski said, quickly interjecting, “My players got looks for him. All of a sudden, boom, we have a double-digit lead.”

Dawkins ignited that explosion of a lead, sinking six of seven 3-pointers and finishing with 20 points. But since he played for just 15 minutes, it was almost like he found a way for the wick to burn more quickly than expected.

Krzyzewski wasn’t wrong in first saying that Duke provided Dawkins with the open looks. He made it clear with his actions on the sideline that the Blue Devils needed to be busily working the ball around.

With a little more than two minutes to play, Krzyzewski rose from his bench seat and put one foot forward. He put his hands together, then pushed them away from each other, parting the air. His players noticed, distributed the ball throughout Pitt’s exhausted defense and went up, 75-62, on a 3-pointer that Dawkins nailed from the left corner. 

“Andre was the difference,” Krzyzewski said. “You go 6-of-7 from three, that’s pretty darn good. That’s just darn good.”

Krzyzewski wasn’t the only one struggling for the right words after the game ended and the enthusiasm had been sucked from the Petersen Events Center. 

Sophomore guard James Robinson, redshirt senior forward Lamar Patterson and Young sat in the news conference, looking dejected, drained and disappointed. Their voices barely rose above murmurs, and Robinson sported a small scratch under his left eye — tangible evidence of the crushing defeat.

“We made a lot of mental mistakes on defense,” Young said, begrudgingly. 

“We were switching [sometimes], and didn’t switch [other times], or simple things like hedging or being slow on hedges or not being there for rushed,” he added, laying out the basketball jargon explaining what prevented the Panthers from getting a hand in the Blue Devils’ faces.

Then Young simplified Pitt’s gaffes: “They just got a lot of open shots. A lot of open shots lead to a lot of makes.”