Coach K is expecting change. Of course, he's not just talking about losing his top two scorers and his associate head coach. Mike Krzyzewski is referring to his team's ability to adapt.
“We are going to change the way we do a few things or how we run a practice, how we do our game preparation,” Krzyzewski said. “It’s been a very busy spring adapting to the newness of the culture you are in and also the newness of the different staff.”
In conjunction with that, he envisions his next Duke team being more mentally nimble, able to adjust on the fly to produce better results.
“I’d like for us to be a smarter team,” Krzyzewski said. “Not that we were dumb. But smart in an instant. Smart while things are going on. Being able to make changes while the game is going on. We weren’t a team that could do that last year. I would hope that we would be able to do that and that means that we can do a little more.”
It's hard to know whether the public will see anything different. I doubt that the fans that show up on the Duke message boards after a loss will finally get to see the zone that they have been calling for. It is interesting to hear a man that has had so much success talk about the need for change though.
Duke's roster will shift to a more traditional format with Jahlil Okafor filling the big man role. One would expect that alone calls for a change to the Duke offense. Of course, its on the defensive side where poor production calls for the most change. The Blue Devils ranked 116th in Adjusted Defensive Efficiency last season. Did I mention your not likely to see a zone?
