The Blue Devils welcome ESPN's College Gameday along with the Louisville Cardinals into Cameron Indoor Stadium. Head coach Chris Mack boasts a 34 - 17 record at Louisville in his second season. Louisville enters Saturday at 14-3 and tied with Duke at 5-1 for first place in the ACC. The Cardinals have rattled off three straight wins after dropping two straight and three of the previous five.
Preseason ACC Player of the Year Jordan Nwora leads the ACC in scoring at 20.4 points overall and 21.2 points in conference games. The Buffalo, N.Y., native scored 14 in the team’s overtime win at Pitt Tuesday. Dwayne Sutton is averaging 9.2 points, 9.1 rebounds and shooting a team-leading .523 from the field. The Cardinals start 3 seniors and 2 juniors.
Duke vs Louisville
Saturday’s game is the 17th meeting between Duke and Louisville, with the Blue Devils leading 10-6.
- Duke has won three straight in the series and is 3-1 in games at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
- Nine games in the series have been Top 25 matchups, with Duke winning five.
- Five of the last six games in the series have been decided by less than 10 points.
- Last season at Louisville, Duke trailed 59-36 with 9:55 left before a remarkable comeback win, 71-69 -- the second-largest in program history and the largest under Coach K.
- Zion Williamson scored 27 and Cam Reddish scored 22, including the tying triple with 1:28 left and go-ahead free throws with 14 seconds remaining.
- Louisville head coach Chris Mack has faced the Blue Devils eight times as an assistant, going 2-5 against Duke while on Skip Prosser’s staff at Wake Forest from 2002-04 and 0-1 while on Sean Miller’s Xavier staff from 2004-09.
Duke
Last time out the Blue Devils had their 9 game winning streak snapped by a buzzsaw Clemson Tigers team (79-72) the Blue Devils did their part to aid the Tigers missing 50% of their free throws and committing 15 turnovers.
Duke goes into Satuday looking to reestablish themselves and to cut down on the mistakes. The Blue Devils come in at 15-2 and 5 & 1 in the ACC. The Blue Devils have relied heavily on their defense so far this season and are 5th in the nation in blocked shots, 19nd in steals and 48th in total rebounding but 24th in offensive rebounding.
Duke enters the game second nationally in scoring margin at +19.8, with its last nine wins coming by +28.1. Six of Duke’s 15 wins are by 30+ points, including three ACC wins by 30+. The 39-point margin in the BC win (88-49) was Duke’s largest in an ACC game since beating Georgia Tech, 110-57, on Jan. 3, 2017 and marked the 23rd time in history Duke won an ACC game by 39+ points.
Vernon Carey Jr. leads the Blue Devils in both scoring and rebounding, nearly averaging a double-double with 17.6 points per game and 8.5 rebounds. Carey also leads the team in blocks at 2 per game. Tre Jones leads the Blue Devils in assists at 6.8 per game, he also averages 15 points and a team leading 2.3 steals per game. Cassius Stanley and Matthew Hurt round out the double figure scorers for the Blue Devils with 11.7 and 10.6 points per game respectively. The Blue Devils are 24th in the nation in assists.
