Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hey there, Duke fans. Welcome to DBR Bytes episode number 149. Of course, we are here. Donald, Jason, we're here to preview the UNC game that is coming up this weekend. Revenge is on the menu. And for me, I think revenge is a dish best served in Cameron on Saturday night. Jason, how are we doing this afternoon? It's been it's been a busy week for both of us.
You with work, me with work and soccer and basketball. But we're looking ahead. We're looking forward to Saturday night.
Yeah, always. The Carolina game. So special. Of course. Of course. Of course. Yeah, I've been I've been crazy busy. I'm not sure folks have heard. I work at CNN.
Chapter 2: What is the significance of the Duke vs. UNC rematch?
There's been a war going on. I've been covering the war all week long. So, yeah, it's been a busy week, and I am ready for a weekend where I don't think about that stuff too much and where I focus on concluding an incredible, incredible regular season for the Duke Blue Devils.
Regardless of how Saturday turns out, I would say this regular season has been far beyond what any of us thought it would be. Yeah, I mean, if you think about it. I was going to say, look, we expect Duke to win every game, of course.
But it's still, just in terms of the progress this team has made, and the way they've made it, and the schedule that they faced, and the way they've done against that. If I told you at the start of this season, Donald, that this team was going to eclipse a plus 40 efficiency mark on Ken Palm, you would have checked me into a mental hospital.
like even if i said to you oh they're going to be the number one team in the land you've been like oh okay i can yeah i can see it maybe happening but like what they've done the way they've gotten there it's ridiculous
It's been so much fun to watch, and again, within the ACC at least, we have a chance to avenge the only loss that we have on our record in conference to date. And it's funny, we're going to talk about the ACC schedule a little bit later. We're going to talk about the fact that it's senior night. Malik Brown, Cam Sheffield, Jack Scott will be playing their senior game in camera.
We'll talk a little bit about that later. But Jason... We're the one seed. We're locked in. We already won the conference outright. UNC is actually locked into the fourth seed for the ACC tournament. So this could happen again next week. So all we have to rely on is just clean old-fashioned hatred for one another. That's all we're going to go with. Those kind of vibes on Saturday.
Again, revenge. That's the dish that I will hopefully be eating along with the rest of you at the expense of the Tar Heels on Saturday night. Let's, as we do when we play teams multiple times in season, let's get into what they've done since we last played UNC back on February 7th. Since that game. UNC is five and two. They lost immediately afterwards like that following Tuesday to Miami by nine.
And that was the game that Caleb Wilson fractured his hand and was rendered out for the next six games. And he is still out. We'll have an update on him in just a minute. They then came back, beat Pitt by 14. And then they got throttled by NC State. But that was a game they did not have Henry Visar as well as Caleb Wilson in the lineup. They got throttled 82-58 and looked terrible in that game.
But since then... They have won four straight. It hasn't been great. It hasn't been a solid, you know, butt whipping or anything. But they beat Syracuse by 10. They beat Louisville by three, Virginia Tech by seven, and Clemson by four. Visar was back in the lineup, has since returned to the lineup in that time frame. But again, Caleb Wilson is out.
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Chapter 3: How does Caleb Wilson's absence impact UNC's performance?
Their free throw rate is even better without Caleb Wilson than it was with him, which is kind of amazing. And you see it like their most recent game against Clemson, Clemson shot a total, and Duke fans will remember, Clemson shot a total of six free throws in this game. That's ridiculous. Just so you understand, in Clemson's previous game against Louisville, they shot 34 free throws.
They went from 34 in one game to six the next game. It's crazy how good Carolina is at convincing the refs not to blow the whistle.
Well, hopefully they won't get the home cooking because if they do, they're going to be doing it on the road on our home floor. Hopefully we're getting the home cooking at least by guys who are getting fouled, actually having the fouls being called for them so they can go to the line and shoot these free throws. Jason, you mentioned, obviously, the last seven games.
And we have to talk about, as we kind of shift to some of the players, we have to talk about the status of Cable Wilson because that's the biggest question for UNC entering this game. Will he be back? And when he got hurt against Miami... back on, what, February 10th, they were basically saying, okay, he's out three to four weeks.
That puts us right at that Duke game, the return game, as him being ready. And literally before we started recording, maybe two minutes before we jumped on, there was an update released on ESPN, and it was comments from Hubert Davis about Caleb's status. Will he be ready for Saturday? The answer is, they don't know.
He has not been cleared yet for 5v5 practice, but he has been doing individual drills and trying to ramp up his individual drills in an effort to be... at least eligible to be in practice, you would think tomorrow, right? We're recording on Thursday. We got one more practice, and then you got the game.
If he's not cleared for 5v5 by tomorrow, it's very doubtful that he would be eligible medically to be cleared in time for the game on Saturday. But who knows, right? The thing about John Shire is... He has stated that they are preparing for this game with him in the lineup and preparing for this game without him in the lineup. And that's all you can really do. I won't be surprised if he plays.
Let's just leave it at that. This is one of those games where people all of a sudden get a shot of adrenaline, maybe a shot of quarter zone, maybe a little hand wrap, and they're good to go. But Jason, talk about what you think about that against the fact that, again,
He torched us in the first half in that first game, but we were able to kind of hold him at bay in the second half, and other guys were the reasons why we ended up in the loss column.
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Chapter 4: What are the implications of Senior Day for Duke players?
Zero minutes played. That is Zayden High. He has actually come on and he's been a starter in a couple of the games lately, especially when Henry Visar was hurt. He sort of moved his way into being Visar's primary backup and also perhaps playing a little bit of power forward because Caleb Wilson isn't around anymore. Zayden High is a functional part of the Carolina rotation.
He's had a couple games where he scored in double figures. He's rebounding really, really well. His rebounding numbers are very impressive since he began to play a little bit more for them six games ago or so when Caleb Wilson got hurt. It is worth noting. I just want to let folks be aware of this. Zayden High was at Carolina.
He was a four-star recruit, a fairly highly touted recruit two years ago. He did not play at all for UNC last year as a sophomore because he was kicked out of school and kicked off the team for – Well, no other way to say it than this. He had sex with a woman with a fellow UNC student, and he recorded it without her permission, and then he let other people watch that recording.
And Carolina said, yeah, you can't do that. And so they kicked him off the team and they kicked him out of school. They have since allowed him back into school and back on the team. I'm not going to comment on whether that's appropriate or not. I do believe in second chances and the such, so I'm not saying the kid should be damned forever.
but i just wanted everyone to be aware zayden high not a not a good dude you know uh all right so let's get to some other guys on the team um henry visar who missed a couple games when Caleb Wilson was also out, just so darn efficient. Over the past four games since he returned, he's hitting close to 71% on his two-point field goals.
Now, it is worth noting his three-point shot has been off lately. Since he returned from this injury four games ago, on the year he's hitting over 42% from three, he's hitting just 23% of his three-pointers over his past four games. So that's something that's been missing from Visar's game, at least lately. Luka Bogovac, who did, like, nothing against Duke. Three points, one of seven shooting.
But Bogovac has seen his playing time tick up since Wilson got hurt, and he's had some big games. He was their MVP. against Clemson earlier this week, a really big game for the heels against Clemson. He hit six three-pointers in that game on his way to scoring 20 points, and several of those three-pointers came late in the – a really close game.
He had a couple backbreakers that allowed Carolina to hold off Clemson. And then the last guy I want to talk about, Seth Trimble. We have to talk about Seth Trimble. He obviously hit the game-winner against Duke last time. He is such a – if you look at him from game to game – It is impossible to tell what you're going to – I mean, look, you're always going to get good defense.
You're always going to get hustle. You're going to get smart plays. Seth Trimble is a senior. He's a four-year starter for UNC. I'm going to talk more about that in a little bit. But he's always going to give you those intangibles. But what he gives you on offense, Donald, it's stunning, stunning how up and down this guy can be. Remember, obviously, what he did against Duke.
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Chapter 5: How have Duke and UNC performed since their last matchup?
Literally went from 16 points, including the game-winning three-pointer against Duke, to not hitting a shot against Miami in the next game. They played NC State, and they lost to NC State. He had four points on one of nine shooting. And then one week later... They play Louisville, and he goes 11 of 16 for 30 points. Dude can get like two, four points one game and 30 the next.
It's impossible to know which Seth Trimble will show up from game to game, but I have a pretty good feeling that probably the Seth Trimble who plays his damn heart out because he wants to be Duke is probably the Seth Trimble we get on Saturday.
Oh, yeah. I mean, look, that game before when he had 16 points, he was the only person on that roster who had played Duke in a UNC uniform. Yeah. And so to be able... I know for him, he mentioned that weight and the fact that we beat him three times last year. He wanted that back.
And sure enough, we might have round three again next week, but this time around for round two, you got to key in on him. And you got to make sure that, again, people tried to say it was something that I put on this team, but... In any of these games, there's always the capability for someone on either team to produce when they haven't been producing lately.
Someone that you don't think of steps up and have a big game. How many times over the last week have we talked about Darren Harris and his ability to come off the bench and score points? In this game against UNC, we talked about, funny enough, we talked about Damesar hitting a couple of threes that were twos because his foot was on the line.
But that was a game where we're like, wow, he's starting to hit the outside shot. He hadn't been doing that to that point. He emerged. as a guy who could hit that outside shot in this game. This game can make people play bigger than themselves. And so we have to key in on all these guys, especially the guys who have gained confidence in the absence of Caleb Wilson.
And even with Henry Visar in the couple games that he was out of the lineup, you want to be able to make sure that these guys have zero confidence in Cameron because the one thing you don't want to do is create any momentum. Your last thought on the players before we take a break.
Yeah, Donald, one of the things I think Carolina's been a little bit lucky about lately since they've been playing without Caleb Wilson is that they've mostly been playing at home.
They've had four home games and two road games in their past three games in a row, which have been three of their better results of the year, a victory over Louisville, victory over Clemson, and also over Virginia Tech. All three of those games were home games. And their away games... The away game since he got hurt was just at NC State and at Syracuse. I'm sure State was hot.
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Chapter 6: What are the key metrics to watch in the upcoming game?
He might have been, but he, in any event, bottom line is Cameron's different. And I think these guys, look, they'll be, I'm sure they'll be prepared mentally. At least they hope they will be. But I don't know. I think that you can never underrate how much the home crowd in Cameron in a big game can get into the heads of the opposing team.
Yeah, I think, again, this game has the opportunity to have a magnitude way above that that your team has been playing. And so we can't expect the struggles of UNC to show up in Cameron on Saturday. We just have to meet the intensity of the moment. And so we're going to talk about that. We're going to talk about the things to watch in this game. But first, let's take a quick break.
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All right, we are back. We continue our preview of the big game against UNC. Again, that game Saturday evening, 6.30 p.m. Eastern Time on ESPN. We're going to talk about the things to watch. And the first thing I think in this game is when you have a lot of the pageantry that surrounds the final game of the season, it's very easy to come out flat.
It's very easy to come out unfocused or at least just... the ball of nerves that kind of naturally develop when you're just want to, you know, play your heart out for the last game in that gym. And, you know, of course we're undefeated in Cameron. We want to stay undefeated in Cameron this year to do that. We got to start out sharp. And that's, I think a mindset of we've done that before.
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Chapter 7: How does Cameron Indoor Stadium influence game outcomes?
And then last thing I wanted to mention about this Carolina game, and then there's something I want to do about seniors and such, but last thing I want to mention about this Carolina game, there was Hubert Davis was on his radio show earlier this week. I don't mean to mock Hubert, you know, He's a good guy.
But on the radio show, he said, hey, I just want everybody to know I've been getting more into analytics this year. He said, yeah, I've got Marcus Page and Sean May, two of my assistant coaches, are really helping me out with analytics. In fact, he was like, he was so proud of this.
He goes, Marcus Page gives me a full report on all the analytics about every player on the team every 10 games or so. Donald, Hubert Davis is getting an analytics report every 10 games? Well, welcome to like, I don't know, like 2005 or 2006, Hubert. I mean, are you kidding me? Every 10 games? He's got two assistants who are like helping him to figure out analytics a little bit. Good guy.
I bet I bet John Shire has five or six guys on the staff who like do nothing but analytics. I guarantee you, John Shire is thinking, talking, discussing, and using analytics, not every game, every halftime.
This is just, it's hysterical to me that the thing that is changing basketball at all levels, the use of advanced analytics, Hubert Davis is all proud about the fact that he's looking at it once every 10 games. Goodness gracious, Carolina, please give him a lifetime contract.
I mean, look, there's something to be said about the eye test, right? On this show, we talk about how you're very much an analytics.
I'm not saying it's worthless. I get you.
Yeah, and I love the eye test because I can look at a team and go, that team is good, and here's why. But you have a balance. And even me, right? Like back then when you were doing all the analytics, I was like, Jason, you go ahead and take all that stuff. And I've started to embrace what it can mean, right? And how it can factor into just an overall evaluation of a team.
And we talk about analytics on the show all the time. And so I almost don't want them to embrace this. I want them to go ahead and just make it every 30 games. Right. Do it once a year. Kind of ease into this thing, baby, because the last thing we want is for them to feel like they're getting any better because of their starting to pay attention to analytics.
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Chapter 8: What should fans expect from the players during Senior Day?
He had one point on 0 of 3 shooting. He did have a six assists. But Jordan also then got an extra, you know, an extra COVID year. The last, you know, other than Jeremy Roach, the last sort of big senior game we had, Donald, you and I were at the game. Or at least I know I was. Oh, maybe you weren't there with me. I was not at the game. It was Justin Robinson, Javin Delorier, and Jack White.
It was 2020. That's right. You weren't there. I was there on press.
I was at the game before that when Jack White, who had had a drought of like a month and a half of not hitting a three, me and Sam were in the building when he hit that three against Miami.
Yes, exactly. The place went crazy. No, but that was the last senior game where all three of those guys started. Coach K started all three of them.
um in in 2020 uh jack white had a six trillion he played six minutes didn't record any stats javon delorier played 11 minutes he had three steals in 11 minutes he was two of two but that fell forever game that game shall forever be the justin robinson game justin robinson's senior game Game of his life, 13 points, hits four out of six three-pointers. He had four blocked shots. J-Rob, oh my God.
That game was legendary. That was the game, Donald, that made me decide I cannot sit on press row anymore. I need to sit because I was celebrating with every J-Rob three-pointer. I was like, this is not appropriate for press row.
And this is the game that we were like, we came out of that game and we're like, this team is about to win a lot of hardware and then COVID took it away from us.
Oh, I just don't even want to think about it. Oh, it's just so depressing. Yeah. So I had that sort of senior day kind of reflection. It was mostly because I just wanted to go back to the J-Rob game. What a great game that was. But I'm also, I'm going to be intrigued to seeing, you think Malik Brown gets to start on Saturday?
Yeah.
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