Duke makes it look easy, to play for title Monday
By Ken Tysiac
ktysiac@charlotteoberver.com
Posted: Sunday, Apr. 04, 2010
INDIANAPOLIS -- One of Duke's coaches shouted to guard Nolan Smith as the shot clock wound down with West Virginia desperately needing to stop the Blue Devils to get back in the game.
"Six, five."
Smith dribbled right, turned the corner at the free throw line and drove for a gorgeous right-handed layup with 7 minutes, 7 seconds remaining.
Too easy. In what was supposed to be a defensive duel, West Virginia never found a way to stop Smith, Kyle Singler and Jon Scheyer as Duke rolled to a 78-57 win Saturday night in the NCAA semifinals in front of a crowd of 71,298 at Lucas Oil Stadium.
The Blue Devils used excellent 3-point shooting and tenacious rebounding by center Brian Zoubek to advance to the NCAA championship game for the first time since they won the 2001 NCAA title.
Duke (34-5), the No. 1 seed out of the South Region, will play No. 5 regional seed Butler (33-4) at 9:21 p.m. Monday in the NCAA championship game.
This season's Duke team crashed its way into the Final Four by depending largely on physical half-court defense. On Saturday, though, Duke's half-court offense cranked into high gear.
Scheyer scored 23 points, Singler 21 and Smith 19 Duke shot 29-for-55 from the field, including 13-for-25 from 3-point range.
"Can't we guard?" exasperated West Virginia coach Bob Huggins pleaded with his team early in the second half.
They couldn't, and Zoubek added to the offense as he crashed the boards hard with his 7-foot-1 frame to grab 10 rebounds. He added three assists, many of them on kick-out passes to 3-point shooters after offensive rebounds.
It wasn't a perfect night for Duke, by any means. West Virginia (31-7), the No. 2 seed from the East Regional, demonstrated on offense in the first half why it had won the Big East tournament and upset top-seeded Kentucky in the regional final.
The Mountaineers shot 13-for-26 from the field in the first half, but West Virginia's defense never found an answer for Duke.
After a week of questions from reporters about how Duke would handle West Virginia's 1-3-1 zone defense, the Mountaineers opened in a man-to-man.
Regardless of the defense used, junior forward Singler was ready after shooting an abysmal 0-for-10 from the field in the Blue Devils' regional final win over Baylor.
The Blue Devils immediately got the ball to Singler in the low post on a set play. The shot was blocked, but Singler bounced back quickly. Coach Mike Krzyzewski clapped his hands hard after Singler scored early on a driving layup.
By halftime, Singler had 14 points on 6-for-12 from the field as Duke was on target from 3-point range. Smith made three 3-pointers and Singler and Scheyer two apiece as Duke led by as many as 11 points in the first half and held a 39-31 advantage at halftime.
West Virginia tried its zone just once before halftime. Smith immediately sank a 3-pointer to take the Mountaineers out of it.
The only negative point for the Blue Devils in the first half was that Smith committed three fouls and spent the final 2:54 of the half on the bench.
Although West Virginia closed the gap to six points early in the second half, Scheyer immediately answered with a 3-pointer from the wing with 15:28 remaining, and Duke began to pull away to a lead that reached 15 points.
ktysiac@charlotteobserver.com or 919-829-8942
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