Duke Wins a Tough One in Miami 81-74

Duke survives a tough road game in Miami, the story of the game has to be the play of Brian Zoubek. Coming off the game of his career against MD, Zoubek came through when the big 3 could not, keeping Duke in the game in the first half as Duke struggled to find it’s legs against Miami. A much more confident Zoubs has surfaced, throwing the off-speed pitch to the Miami defense and being offensively aggressive. Making veteran big man moves in the middle and doing his usual great job of setting screens, and rebounding. Great overall game scoring 10 points, pulling down 5 rebounds, dishing out 2 assists and 5 steals.

Miami came out in this game like a team possessed, feeding off of the crowd  Miami hit tough shot after tough shot eventually taking a 12 point half time lead. Duke stormed back in the first 5 minutes of the second half to delete the lead Miami built using defense as a trigger for good offense. Things kicked into high gear as one by one the big 3 began to knock down shots. Miami did not go away easily, there was never a time when Duke was able to rest on the lead, Miami clawed its way back after Duke took a 7 point lead to get it down to 2 before Duke put on another run to finally put the game out of reach.

This game leaves Duke with 4 ACC games left, 2 away (UVA, MD) and 2 home games (UNC and VT) with a home game against Tulsa in the middle. 4 straight road wins in the ACC leaves Duke in very good shape for a regular season ACC crown.