Chapter 1: What is the preview for the Boston College Eagles game?
Hey there, Duke fans. Welcome to episode number 140 of DBR Bites of the Duke Basketball Roundup. Donald here. Jason also here. We are here to preview the Boston College Eagles game that is coming up on Tuesday night in Cameron Indoor Stadium, 7 p.m. Eastern time on ACC Network. Jason. We're fresh off of the win against Virginia Tech. Hopefully everybody is safe.
Hopefully at this point they'll, you know, they will be able to safely play the game. I know there's a lot of snow that dropped in the triangle area, but your thoughts as we get into this game about where we are right now, because I think it's important to kind of look back now that we're kind of halfway through the ACC schedule.
Uh, um, I can't imagine being in a better place than where we are.
Chapter 2: How has Boston College performed this season?
I guess, wait, we could be one point better. We could be, we could have beaten, uh, Texas tech, uh, by the way, shout out, congrats to Johnny Dawkins. One of the surprise teams in the country and, and Texas tech, maybe think of it because Johnny Dawkins, central Florida beat Texas tech, uh,
yesterday uh another big upset win if you look at the big 12 standings there are a bunch of teams ranked like in the top 10 top 15 like it's just full of these top 15 teams and props to the big 12 for being so good uh there's also a team in there called central florida that no one expected to be good and again just mad props to jd for doing what they've done this year and for that big win over texas tech
Nope, you're lying, Jason. We thought they were going to be good because we said as much after the preseason game that we played, the Brotherhood run, where they played and we said, oh, Central Florida is going to surprise some people in the Big 12. We said it back then. I still believe it now.
Chapter 3: What statistics highlight Boston College's strengths and weaknesses?
So congratulations to Johnny Dawkins for that big win over Texas Tech. We're not here to preview that game or recap that game. We're here to preview the game against Boston College. Again, that game coming on Tuesday night. End camera, indoor stadium. And let's take a look at Boston College because unlike some of the teams we've played previously in the ACC, Jason, This team is not as great.
They're 9-12 so far this year, 2-6 in the ACC. That's good for 14th, so they're fighting to be even in the ACC tournament at this point because only the top 15 teams go to the ACC tournament. They only have one top 100 win in Kempom. That is against Syracuse. They came in overtime. They had basically four losses to start the ACC season and then two losses
wins in a row before they've gotten back on the losing end of things entering this game.
You know, this BC team is not totally inept. I just want to say that.
Well, Jason, before you do that, let's paint some context as to why you would say that.
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Chapter 4: Who are the key players to watch from Boston College?
Go ahead.
Because the context on paper leads people to believe that this team is inept because they're bad losses. are some pretty bad ones. They have FAU. Okay, that's fine. Central Connecticut was the one that was really bad. Central Connecticut being 296th in Ken Palm. They also have losses to Davidson, Tulane, who is at 200, UMass, who's at 182. These are bad.
in conference to Georgia Tech, which, again, we've played Georgia Tech. Georgia Tech is a tough team, but they're one of the worst teams in the ACC alongside Boston College. They did play on Saturday. They played Virginia at home. They lost to them by seven. So, again, showed some fight, but they have 11 games offensively where they've only scored 70 points or lower.
They have four games under 60 points. They only have one game where they failed to score 50 points.
Chapter 5: What are the challenges Duke might face against Boston College?
So... Jason, I know we're going to talk about the metrics, but as we look at this, 142 in Ken Palm, 152 in the net as of today, quad three game barely as we do this. But again, we're looking at this game because it's important to get out to a tough start or to a good start in this game against a team that, yes, on paper we should beat, but who's going to come out trying to fight to get a win.
Yeah, I wanted to point out, like I said, A lot of the things we're going to say, you're going to go, wow, they suck. But they're not completely devoid of talent, and they're not completely inept. You mentioned that UVA game that they lost by seven. That was a single possession game for almost the entire second half of it. BC had a lead at times. UVA could never put them away.
Seven points doesn't really tell the full story of how close that game was. And UVA is really good. They played a game with NC State. It was like a two-point game with 10 minutes left. They took a very decent LSU team, like a top 50 LSU team, to overtime. They played Louisville. They led Louisville by eight early in the second half.
Chapter 6: How is the ACC shaping up for NCAA tournament bids?
Like, they were up on Louisville. Now, these are all games they lost. But it shows you that BC is not... unable to play with good teams because those are all good teams. It's just that at some point, BC has a meltdown. At some point, their tendency to take really, really, really bad shots crops up. They take really bad shots, and I'll get into that in a little bit.
I did want to give a little historical context about this BC team. Donald, I'm going to ask you to guess. When do you think was the last time Boston College finished in the top 50 in Ken Palm in a season?
In the top 50 in Ken Palm? Yeah.
Chapter 7: What are the implications of the ACC's performance this season?
I'm going to say... Oh, and I'm blanking on the name of the player who gave us fits. I want to say like 2011. So I'll go with that guess.
Okay, you're close. It's 2007. Okay. It's been almost 20 years since they were a top 50 team. They have only been in the top 100 in Ken Palm twice in the past 15 years. This is a program... This is a program that is just not good. This is just the worst program in the ACC. No question about it.
Chapter 8: What are the final thoughts before the game against Boston College?
So let's get into the metrics. We're talking, they're pretty good on defense, Donald. I'm not sure if you noticed, they're like almost top 50 on defense, 275th on offense. My gosh, like how is that even possible for a power conference team to be that bad on offense? I'll start with the defense. And there's a strange quirk helping them out on defense.
One of the reasons they're so good on defense is because they are the number one team in the country, best team, 360 plus teams in college basketball. No one is better than Boston College at free throw defense.
I love that stat. It's the greatest stat in sports.
Somehow Boston College's opponents only hit 65.5% at their free throw line. Now, if you want proof that free throw defense is totally random, this is not something that Boston College is good at every year. In fact, just two years ago, they had one of the 20 worst free throw defenses in all of college basketball.
So somehow they worked really hard, Donald, the past couple of seasons at their free throw defense.
A couple of portal additions to help them out there.
Oh, my God. This is just bizarre. It's just random, but it really helps them out. Part of them getting teams to shoot poorly against them is at the free throw line. But part of it is they actually play good defense. Like teams only hit less than 30% of their threes against Boston College. Teams just hit 46.5% of their two-point shots, which is really good.
And I'm going to talk a little bit later. They've got two guys who are really good shot blockers. When we get into the players, I'll get into those guys. But just trust me, this Boston College team forces you into bad shots. And they don't let you get good shots at the rim.
Their effective field goal percentage defense, which is a combination of threes and twos, their effective field goal percentage defense is top 20 in all of college basketball. That is really, really good. Now, the other stuff on defense, they're really bad at getting steals. They don't turn you over. But teams just don't hit shots against them.
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