Duke Basketball Report

A trio of topics on this latest edition of the Duke Basketball Roundup. Up first is the 2024 Summer Olympics. Jason and Donald recount some of their favorite moments so far before diving into the controversy over Jayson Tatum not playing in Team USA's first game. If you are here for outrage, you will hear at least a little bit of it. Up next, the podcast guys dive into the changes coming to NIL and especially to scholarship limits in the NCAA. This whole thing seems like a never-ending topic but the latest changes are quite significant to the future of college sports. And after the break, Jason and Donald give their favorite moments from the latest edition of the Brotherhood Podcast featuring a remarkably revealing interview with Cooper Flagg. What Cooper says about himself and his teammates reveals a lot about the makeup of this team and how it is trying to sculpt itself into a championship club. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The latest edition of the Duke Basketball Roundup features a look at the rankings of Bart Torvik, who plugged a whole bunch of data into his computer and asked it to give him an analytical preseason ranking of every team in college basketball. It spat out two teams at the very top of the heap, the Houston Cougars and the Duke Blue Devils. It even projects how many points per game Cooper Flagg, Khaman Maluach, and Kon Kneuppel will average next season. But, before that look at ones and zeroes, the podcast gang has a long conversation about the wild, wild west that is the current NIL landscape. Friend of the podcast Brendan Marks has helped write an article for The Athletic that takes a deep dive into the truth and lies behind NIL and the transfer portal, with some eye-opening anecdotes. The DBR guys give you their takeaways from a revealing and troubling look at how college basketball has been fundamentally changed over the past couple years... and the changes show no signs of slowing down. Learn more about yo

After some time off, we’re back with Episode 638 as we get ready for the Olympics! The Olympics begin this week, and Jason and Donald go through all of the Duke Blue Devils who will be competing and coaching in the Summer Games. Short of ACC newcomers Stanford and Cal, Duke is sending the most athletes in the conference to Paris, which is really cool. We focus in on Khaman Maluach’s performance against the USA in a basketball exhibition where South Sudan almost had the monumental upset. Maluach showed some good things and some things to work on, and Jason and Donald break down all that he did and how it could translate to Duke. After the break, we discuss NBA Summer League and DJ Steward absolutely balling out for the Chicago Bulls. He did so well that he earned a two-way contract for this coming season, which is really cool! He follows a line of Blue Devils who have recently found their way into the NBA via unconventional paths, like through the G League. We’re glad that Steward is getting an opportunity to

We’re back with Episode 637, where we are joined by Jon Chepkevich of Draft Express to discuss some Duke Blue Devils and their NBA prospects! Recently, Sion James and Tyrese Proctor competed at the CP3 Elite Camp, while Kon Knueppel and Isaiah Evans attended the Jayson Tatum Elite Camp, and Chepkevich was present at both to view the athletes. We go through each of the players one by one, breaking down what they did well at the camps, what they can improve on, and their current draft prospects according to Draft Express. Chepkevich also has seen a lot of Cooper Flagg and Khaman Maluach, and we take the time to go through their pros and cons. Both are expected to be high draft picks, with Flagg being #1, so it’s good to get an outside perspective about their abilities and how they could improve at Duke. After we say goodbye to Jon, Cooper Flagg has really broken out with his stellar play at USA Basketball training camp on the USA Select Team. We review some of the footage that we saw coming out of the scrimmage

After taking a short July 4th holiday break, the Duke Basketball Roundup is back with a Vegas-heavy edition of DBR Bites. Donald spent a few days perusing the casinos of the strip this week and he came back with a list of the teams the sports books love and hate for next season in college basketball. Where does Duke rank and what does Vegas think of the ACC? Have a listen to find out. After the break, the podcast gang dives into early NBA summer league results including a former Dukie who looks like one of the best rim protectors in the entire summer league landscape. And last but not least, we have seen some short videos of Cooper Flagg playing in Vegas with the USA Basketball Select Team against the very best players in the world on Team USA. How did Cooper do when matched up with Lebron James, Jayson Tatum, Kawhi Leonard, and others? We have the answer on the latest edition of the DBR Podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 2024-25 Duke Blue Devils are in the gym for summer workouts, and we have some intel from one of the practices courtesy of a listener! We discuss what we learned on DBR Bites Episode 54. Jason was able to speak to one of our listeners, who gave us some fantastic information about a practice they were allowed to watch. We go through each of the players and discuss what our listener saw from them. And there are some general insights on how the team looked and what some of the themes may be this season. One thing's for sure: we're going to learn a lot more about this team as the summer goes along! After the break, Cooper Flagg is leaving Duke to play for another team. That team: the USA Select team, which is a group of players who help the USA Basketball team prepare for the Olympics. Cooper's the only non-pro on the team and has made the team before playing a second of college basketball. It's a huge honor and we are excited at Cooper getting able to go up against some of the best players in the world and le

The NBA Draft has been completed, and we discuss where Jared McCain and Kyle Filipowski will begin their NBA careers on Episode 636! The NBA Draft was a 2-day affair this year, and we had to go through both days to learn where McCain and Flip ended up. Jared McCain was drafted 16th by the Philadelphia 76ers, and Jason and Donald are really happy about what could be a great situation for him in the Association. Jared could fit in not just with his shooting and rebounding ability, but with his personality and work ethic. We also discuss Kyle Filipowski, both on the court and off the court. He slips to the second round, eventually being drafted by the Utah Jazz with the 32nd pick. We discuss what happened pre-draft that could have caused him to slip out of the first round and be left in the green room after night 1. We also get into the stories that have come up about his current relationship and what we have heard about how it affected not just his draft stock, but his world. After the break, there were some Du

Time for part 2 of the DBR Podcast's NBA Draft preview with Jay Bilas. This time, we focus on Jared McCain, who has a great chance to be taken in the back end of the lottery after a season in which he showed he is one of the top few shooters in all of college basketball. Jason and Donald also get Jay's thoughts on the notion that the NCAA tournament will expand to add 4 or maybe 8 more teams. And last but not least, the DBR Podcast highlights some recent stats about Duke's media exposure in football and basketball. Can you guess where Duke falls on the list of most watched teams in the ACC in the two big revenue sports? We all know football is the king of the ratings and Duke isn't exactly a huge football draw, but you may be surprised where the Blue Devils land compared to the rest of the league. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There is no tradition quite like the DBR Podcast spending far too much time pouring over "raw, uncut" video of the Duke team playing a summer scrimmage. So, when the Duke social media team dropped its first heavily edited video of the summer, you just knew Jason and Donald would hop on a Duke Basketball Roundup podcast to chat about it. There is little question that Sion James and Kon Knueppel looked great in this video but there was plenty other stuff to notice and draw (wild) conclusions from. Duke has released the official roster so the podcast guys also spend some time talking about the size of this Duke team, one of the biggest teams in recent moment. And, after the break, we get to hear about Donald's long, personal relationship with a fast-rising recruit in the class of 2025 who just got a scholarship offer from Jon Scheyer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As we do every year around this time, the Duke Basketball Roundup welcomes Jay Bilas to the podcast to help us preview the NBA Draft. And, because this is a Duke-centric podcast, our primary focus is on the Dukies hoping to hear their names called nice and early on Draft night. Our conversation with Jay will be broken into two parts and in part one, we talk about Kyle Filipowski's draft prospects. Did he improve his stock by coming back to Duke for his soph campaign, where does Jay think Flip will get taken, and what role might Flip play for the team that drafts him? Plus, Jason and Donald ask Jay about the big news that JJ Redick has been hired as head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. What does one former Dukie who works at ESPN think about another former Dukie who works at ESPN getting a head coaching job? Have a listen and find out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re honored to have Brenden Marks of The Athletic back to continue our conversation on Episode 632! On Part 1, we focused on Duke’s rebuilt roster, and on Part 2 of our interview, we expand our scope to the other 17 teams in the ACC. Marks discusses how some of the teams did in the transfer portal, with some of the teams that got much better and some of the teams that he felt missed an opportunity to improve. We discuss some of UNC’s issues with recruiting a big man and how the changing landscape of NIL has affected how teams recruit new players. We finally end with some of the players coming back that could help their teams and which teams to watch as they try to rise to the top half of the conference standings next season. After we say goodbye to Brendan Marks, Jason and Donald go into further discussion on several points that arose during the interview. Needless to say, we could have stayed on for a couple more hours with Brendan and not fully discussed every facet of roster construction, but we’re grate

There were tears of joy on the floor of the TD Garden last night as Jayson Tatum reached the pinnacle of basketball greatness, leading his Boston Celtics to a world championship. The Duke Basketball Roundup has all the stats and info about Tatum's remarkable performance and what it means for his place among the Duke greats to have played in the NBA. And, of course, the guys also have comments about all the other Dukies connected to the NBA finals including Kyrie, Lively, Amile, and even Steve Pagliuca. After the break, the DBR Podcast takes a moment to celebrate some of the greatest Duke athletes of all time, the newest inductees to the Duke Athletics Hall of Fame. Included among them are a fencer, a diver, a 3-time national champion in golf, a couple football players, a father-son lacrosse duo, and two of the best men's and women's basketball players to ever wear a Duke blue uniform. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Duke Blue Devils 2024-25 roster is rebuilt, and now they’re in the lab to gel into a team this summer. As they do so, we look back at how Duke did in the transfer portal and what we can expect from the team next season. On Episode 631, we welcome back Brendan Marks of The Athletic for an incredible interview that is broken down into two parts. This episode focuses on Part 1 of our interview, in which Marks helps us understand more about how this roster was constructed. We start with the transfer portal and how Duke did in relation to the rest of the conference at filling the holes that the roster had. This is a pivotal year for Duke, and Marks believes that the portal additions will help Duke in so many ways. We then focus on some of the freshmen coming in as well as where the main returnees - Tyrese Proctor and Caleb Foster - fit into the mix. This team will be built around Cooper Flagg, but you won’t want to miss what Brendan thinks of the potential starting 5 - competition may drive who gets some of th

Few people have touched the hearts of Duke fans the way Bob Harris has. For 41 years he was the voice of the Blue Devils, calling thousands of football and basketball games, using his voice to paint the pictures we could not see. So, it is with so much sadness that Duke nation today mourns Bob's passing after a battle with Alzheimer's. This episode of the Duke Basketball Roundup includes a couple of Bob's legendary calls and moments of remembrance from Jason and Donald. Before we get to the sad news, the episode starts with word that the ACC-SEC Challenge matchups are set. Duke will be playing a very impressive Auburn club and the game will happen in Cameron. The DBR podcast breaks down some of what to expect from the Challenge and from the latest in a long line of difficult non-conference opponents Duke will be playing next season. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is a listener participation episode of the Duke Basketball Roundup. In honor of Duke bringing in a super impressive-looking defensive roster for the 2024-25 campaign, Jason and Donald conduct a Duke Defense draft. They each pick 5 starters and 1 sixth man to form the best defensive team they can. You are going to hear legendary names like Shane Battier, Billy King, Shelden Williams, and Tommy Amaker. The DBR Podcast needs all of you to listen to the back half of the episode and then send us an email at DBRPodcast at gmail dot com to resolve which team is the better set of defenders! But, this latest episode begins with the breaking news that Dan Hurley is saying no to the Lakers are staying in college basketball. Jason and Donald spend a little time discussing what it says about the college game to have the hottest coach in the land pulling a Coach K and turning down a lucrative NBA offer. The guys also dive in the transfer portal to talk about the rash of high-profile ACC players who have decided the gr

The DBR guys start this episode by breaking down the fabulous conversation between Jay Bilas and Jon Scheyer on the latest episode of The Brotherhood Podcast. Scheyer may talk in coach speak, but if you read between the lines you can really hear some interesting insight into the team he is forming this coming season and what he hopes for Duke basketball going forward. Plus, the hints, nudges, and secrets just keep on coming out of Durham following the K Academy games. The Duke Basketball Roundup gang spoke to someone with intimate knowledge of how the 2024-25 Blue Devils are shaping up and got some very interesting nuggets. And, before all is said and done, Jason and Donald have a hat tip to the the men's basketball team (and a bunch of other Duke athletes) for some impressive results off the court and in the classroom. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The K Academy is in full effect, and the 2024-25 roster has started doing pickup games with some of the alumni back in town. We discuss what we’ve heard from the first sessions on DBR Bites Episode 50. Before we get to the intel, Jason and Donald discuss an article from the Raleigh News & Observer on how Jon Scheyer rebuilt this roster for next season. There are some very direct remarks from Scheyer on what he was looking for in constructing this roster and it discusses some of the frank conversations that were had on expectations and competition. We give our thoughts on some of the information from the article that we did not know as well as reiterate some of the stuff we have already discussed on the pod. We then get into the intel. Jason has heard some things about how the players have done with some of the first pickup games of the summer, and we go through the players one by one to discuss how they did. More importantly, Jason and Donald are always jealous of the people who get to go to K Academy every y

Get ready for a potpourri of topics as the DBR Podcast crew dive into a bunch stuff happening lately. They begin with the just announced game against Kansas in Las Vegas this season, but what has the crew really excited is the very real prospect of games in future years in Cameron and Phog Allen Fieldhouse. Up next, there will be some unusual numbers on the floor for the Blue Devils this coming season, and the podcast dives into what may have been behind some of the unusual selections. After that, Donald leads the conversation about the phenomenal showing by the Blue Devil softball and baseball crews as they are each advancing to new territory in the College World Series. You know the guys cannot avoid talking about the fabulous showing by Dukies in the NBA playoffs. And then they wrap it all up with a tribute to Bill Walton, one of the greats on the court and with the mic. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Episode 629 of the Duke Basketball Roundup continues our deep dive on the predicted roles for the team, and we welcome back Scott Rich to the show to help us once again! On this episode, we focus on the bigs, and with four main bigs vying to be a part of the Duke rotation - Cooper Flagg, Khaman Maluach, Maliq Brown, and Patrick Ngongba - we discuss what their roles will be. The one we spend a ton of time on is Cooper Flagg because it’s very clear by the moves made that this generational talent will be the focal point of the offense, but who will play alongside him in the frontcourt...and will Cooper play more of the 3 or 4? We discuss all of that in the first (long) segment. After the break, we discuss the walk-ons who will return to Duke for another season: Stanley Borden, Neal Begovich, and Spencer Hubbard. Will their roles change on the team and who might you see on the floor a bit more? We then move onto the major news in the world of NIL and what a potential court settlement could mean for the future of

We got another one! We thought the Duke Blue Devils were done in the transfer portal, but Jon Scheyer’s always closing. Cameron Sheffield will be headed to Durham as a transfer from Rice, and we react to what he brings to the table on DBR Bites Episode 48. Sheffield will head to Durham and is not a guy that’s expected to contend for any significant minutes next season among the guards. But, at 6’6” and with 3 years of D-1 experience under his belt, he still has 2 years of eligibility remaining and can be a guy that can really help the team prepare for games. He can rebound, he’s a consistently decent 3 point shooter, and he will be a guy that can help the team in practice get better. And, there’s more experience added to the roster. Jason and Donald discuss everything and what this means for Duke in 2024-25. After the break, Jason is in New Orleans and got a chance to sit down with Sion James at Tulane for some coffee tea as a way to get to meet him and for Sion to get to know some of the Duke community. Jaso