When Duke trailed Michigan State by five points with just under five minutes remaining in their win-or-go home NCAA matchup, the Blue Devils didn’t narrow their offensive focus to put the ball in the hands of a single, presumably best, player.
Instead Duke turned to a pair of strengths it relied upon all season, one much-discussed, the other virtually unremarked.
Duke’s defense, always a touchstone under Mike Krzyzewski, has wavered throughout the season, sometimes at the most inopportune moments. One consequence was a repeated stress on learning how to finish games, to make the stops that separate victory from defeat.