Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Thank you.
All right, Duke fans, welcome to the latest edition of the Duke Basketball Roundup. We teased it yesterday. It is here today. Special episode in honor of the Carolina game. We're going to have a very special guest on with us in just a moment. But first, I'm Jason Evans. I'm joined by Donald Wein. Donald, we are 24 hours closer to the Carolina game. Are you excited? You ready for it?
I'm always ready for it. But Jason, enough from us. They heard a lot about from us yesterday. Let's get to the man.
We are joined now by none other than Jay Billis, Duke alum and ESPN. What should we call you? Like, dude, you do everything for them. I tried to get you on the other day. You were doing an NBA game.
Yeah, I don't know what they call me now. It used to be we were color commentators. Now we're analysts. So we've risen up in the world, I guess.
Well, we can think of no one better suited to talk about the Duke and Carolina game. And Jay, just so you know, the way we kind of want to do this, if we can, let's try and focus on UNC first, and then we'll take a quick break and we'll talk to you a little bit about the Duke Blue Devils, because obviously there's a lot to talk to about them.
But, you know, a lot of people are excited about the matchup between the two sets of big men. You know, lottery picks, you know, guys who've been in college basketball for a couple of years who are very, very successful. On the UNC side, what is it that's made Caleb Wilson and Henry Visar so successful this year?
Well, they're both really good players. Caleb Wilson is arguably the most explosive front court player in the country. He's unbelievably quick off the floor. And he plays with this verve and energy that you don't see very often. He's not this incredible physical specimen as far as, you know, he's not as sturdy physically.
or have that sort of lower body strength, immovable object type of thing that Cameron Boozer has. But man, is he explosive. And he's a really good passer. He's got an excellent touch, not only around the basket, but from 17 feet and in. He's not a three-point shooter. He can make a three, but that's not what he really does. And then Vessar, who I watched quite a bit play at Arizona,
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Chapter 2: What does Jay Bilas think about Duke's chances in the game?
It's not like they're, you know, you're going to be seeing a team that's going to make 12, 13 threes a game, but they're very capable. And, you know, I think the one thing that they don't do that you've seen in the past is that they're not as devastating a transition team as we've seen in the past. It's not that they don't get up and down the floor because they do.
And I don't think they've been as tough defensively as I expected them to be. They've certainly had moments when they, I mean, they can, there are times when they turn it up, they can really play. But overall, they haven't shown consistently, and that's really the issue, are they consistently going to defend and rebound at the highest level?
And that's why their results have been a little bit up and down, like that road trip they took out to California and lost to Cal and Stanford. I think they're better in both those teams, but they wound up losing both those games. But they won four in a row, and they're dangerous. And this game's always dangerous. I don't ever remember a time where you felt comfortable.
I mean, there have been a couple of times where you go, okay, you know, in this, like Carolina is better this year. Duke's better. You know, you got 0-9. You're like, nobody's beating that team. Stuff like that. There are certain times that happens, but in the quote unquote normal year that you have a Duke Carolina game, you feel kind of awkward saying, well, this team has the advantage.
They may have the advantage in a certain area, but this team's going to win. I never feel comfortable with that in this game.
Jay, you were talking about the defense a moment ago, and it seemed like you were talking effort for Carolina. You don't think it's a – is that the reason for their defensive – they have not been – you know, they have not been a great team on defense very much this year at all. Is it effort? Is it scheme? Is it personnel? Where do you think, you know, that deficiency lies for them?
Yeah. I mean, it's funny, Jason, when you say, you know, when, when we use the word effort, it makes it sound like they're not trying.
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Chapter 3: What makes Caleb Wilson and Henri Veesaar successful for UNC?
And I don't, I don't believe that. So that's not the, maybe that's the wrong word for me to use, but it's such a, it's such a buzzword in the game, but yeah, You guys know how it is. In any defensive possession, you can have four guys that are burning it and doing everything right, and one guy makes a mistake. You still give up the same amount of points, whether you're 80% or 20%.
of guys on the same page. But, you know, the, and I think over the years, there have been certain North Carolina teams and go, I mentioned 09, go back to that team. I mean, you know, I remember Roy Williams not being happy with the way they defended and, and, but he would, but he would say, you know, how, how, how much should I yell at,
when they know they're going to score a hundred points, fall out of bed. And, you know, sometimes I think that, that I felt at least, and I'm not with them in practice every day, but I felt at least, you know, there are times when offensively they're significantly better than who they're playing and, And that kind of bleeds into their defense a little bit.
But when in the games, in certain games where they've been really focused defensively, I think it certainly helps their offense that way. But you're kind of going, man, they're really good. And I think they're top 10 good. This is not like last year where four teams, Duke included, was, I don't want to say head and shoulders better, but you're like, these are the best teams.
I don't feel outside of Arizona and Michigan that we have that. And I think Duke has moved into that category where, you know, they're the team you say next. After you say Arizona, Michigan, you're saying Duke. And there are certainly, you know, you could say, wait a minute, you know, they don't do this as well, don't do that as well. They're not as dynamic here.
You know, Carolina's not in that top five discussion, but they're in the top 10 discussion for sure.
You talked a little bit about the bigs. And when you think about some of these Duke UNC games, there's always some guy that ends up going off and you go, hey, it's the Caleb Foster game or the Seth Trimble game on the other side, something like that. Is there an X factor? Who could be that X factor for UNC that fans may not know about that might have a breakout in this game?
I don't know if it's somebody fans don't know about, but I think Seth Trimble is the engine for that team. And he's their best perimeter defender. He's a really explosive player. He's experienced and he's tough and he's shooting it much better this year. He's gotten consistently better over the course of his career.
You know, he's he's not he's not Wayne Ellington or anything, but he can he can make a shot. And it just the transition game runs better with him out there. He just he's got speed and explosiveness and and he's he's unbelievably strong and he plays bigger. He's probably averaged about 14 a game, but he's consistent like he's their most consistent player.
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Chapter 4: What are the potential advantages UNC has over Duke?
He's been incredible thus far this year, but as you mentioned when we talked about the UNC bigs, this is going to be a tough test for him. Where do you think he stands to be most successful going up against a Caleb Wilson or a Henry Visar inside?
Well, you guys know he's got an unusual processing ability on the floor that it's really hard to speed him up. And because he's such a good passer and he can step away and shoot it, he doesn't have to catch it in certain spots in order to be successful. They do put him in the right spots, but he can catch it eight feet off the lane, back you down. He can he can process a double coming at him.
And he's he's a very low mistake player and really the only. the only way you can deal with them is try to keep him from getting to his left shoulder. And then because he can score over his right shoulder, like he's just not quite as proficient at that, you know? So take the, you know, take the one where he only scores 80% of the time instead of 95.
But I think the, the one thing you have to do when you play against camp losers, you got to put them in a position to defend. And I think you have to go at him. And that's that's really your only hope is stopping him because his consistency. Like I was thinking about this the other day, you know, because most players you can do this pretty easily. What's his worst game?
You know, like what's Cam Boozer's worst game? His first one where he didn't score much. He might not even score in the first half against Texas, and he winds up with like 15 or 16 points at the end. That's correct. Yeah, he dominated the second half. Yeah, it's absurd. And he's double figures every game. He's got 11 double-doubles. I think he's got 13 games of 20 or more.
And four games of 30 or more. And he's the only freshman in Duke history to have 35 twice in a year. And, you know, Duke's had some pretty good freshmen. It's kind of his consistency in the numbers he puts up across the board, scoring, rebounding, assists, steals. Like he's like fourth in the league in steals.
And so there's not really a there's no weakness in his game that you can attack or try to exploit. And when you've got that sort of consistency with your team, other guys can have off days and they can overcome it because he never has one. At least he hasn't had one yet. And it's really remarkable. I mean, Duke fans are kind of spoiled in that, you know, you have Cooper Flagg last year.
And for those that thought we were over-hyping the guy, Cooper Flagg in his last three games in the NBA has averaged 39.5 points per game. Like, he's pretty good. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, Cam is not getting talk right now about being the number one overall pick. But, you know, you look at his productivity, he probably should be.
I mean, look, we talked about this in the last episode, the consistency that you mentioned about him, the fact that he's averaged 14. He's got at least 14 points, five rebounds, and two assists in every game this year, and he's the only person in the 21st century to ever do that. So that kind of consistency is amazing and astounding.
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Chapter 5: Who could be the X-factor for UNC in the upcoming game?
Yeah. Good gig. Hopefully somewhere warm. I got stuck in Lubbock a couple weeks ago, so I'm looking for warmth.
Well, I'm glad your voice is intact after last night's double OT game you called. That was fun. Yeah, it was a lot of fun to watch.
There is nothing like the Garden for a Knicks game. It's awesome. The Duke-Texas Tech game and the games we've had there for the Jimmy V and for the Champions Classic, they're great. I mean, it's great. Doesn't compare. Like when the Knicks are good, that place is awesome. Mm-hmm. It's a lot of fun.