After bowing out of the NCAA Tournament in the Final Four, Duke men’s basketball now faces a rebuild, with several key players leaving for the NBA. In this edition of Take of the Week, the Blue Zone discusses the program’s progress:
Duke head coach Jon Scheyer has little time to mourn his team’s tragic Final Four loss to Houston. With the transfer portal already open for a week, top players like Yaxel Lendeborg, Donovan Dent and Adrian Wooley had already found new destinations before the Blue Devils’ season had even come to an end. Given the late start to the offseason, has Scheyer done enough to prepare a roster that can once again compete at the upper echelon of college basketball?
Returning talent
After having arguably one of the most talented Duke teams of all time, Scheyer and the program now looks to rebuild once again to finally capture that sixth championship. Blue Devil fans, fully adjusted to the Post-K era, now must make another — Post-Flagg. It begs a question: if this team couldn’t win the national championship, could they ever win again?
Let’s begin with returning talent. Duke returns five scholarship players that could all make a significant impact — three more than last year with only Tyrese Proctor and Caleb Foster returning.
This year’s team had immense success offensively, with the nation’s top offense according to KenPom. The Blue Devils averaged almost 10 3-pointers made each game, and with Isaiah Evans extending his collegiate campaign, they will remain dangerous from the perimeter. A projected NBA draft pick and 43.2% 3-point shooter, the Fayetteville, N.C., native was the true spark off the bench for this recent Blue Devil team. With this decision, Evans will finally get his minutes and look to refine his inconsistencies and develop strength, both of which will improve Duke and his draft stock. Most likely backed-up by fellow returner Darren Harris — another good shooter — the Blue Devils will be strong at the shooting guard position.
There are notable Duke guards that have significantly benefited after a second year. Luke Kennard in his sophomore year emerged as the Blue Devils’ top scorer with 19.5 points per game, 43.8% from deep, all-ACC and 12th-overall pick in the NBA draft. Tre Jones won ACC Player of the Year as a sophomore. Evans could definitely join these two in the NBA after a breakout year of his own.
Staying in the backcourt, Foster looks to rewrite his sophomore season and provide that veteran guard presence. Although benched for Sion James against Auburn, Foster reached an inflection point in the Florida State game, finding defensive success that led to key stretches for the team, most notably in the Dean E. Smith Center against North Carolina. But beyond showing incoming freshman Cayden Boozer the ropes, the Harrisburg, N.C., native will double-down with confidence from Duke and coach Scheyer.
Unless Scheyer finds a 7-footer in the portal, Patrick Ngongba and Maliq Brown will be the frontcourt for the next season. Ngongba stepped up when Brown was injured, and has provided strong presences on the offensive and defensive glass. Brown has shown signs of a developing 3-point threat and has incredible passing, which Ngongba has started to incorporate in his own game. Look for the two to continue building off of each other next season.
Also, Scheyer’s acquisitions in the transfer portal last year were not the best transfers available on paper. James was ranked 65th, Maliq Brown 70th and Mason Gillis 95th. Maybe it is an art and a science, and Scheyer was very strategic in his selections, able to sift signals from noise and find additions to balance his roster.
Sure, recruiting from high school and the portal can swing an entire team’s performance, but looking at a team like Houston last year, roster retention is a proven method. The Cougars returned a sharp 75.1% of their minutes played and 73.1% of scoring from their previous roster, and used that continuity to take them to the national championship game. Furthermore, Mike Krzyzewski needed 11 years to win the program’s first championship. It can certainly be upsetting to fall short with incredible talent. However, Duke still has championship-caliber talent in their returners as well as incoming recruits. The Blue Devil faithful must trust Scheyer, his team and the process. -Andrew Negus
Another top freshman class
The class that will actually step foot on campus in the fall is a bit thinner than expected. Five-star wing Shelton Henderson elected to follow Jai Lucas to Miami, and Nate Ament — who had Duke in contention throughout his long recruiting process — ultimately chose Rick Barnes and Tennessee. The incoming trio of Cameron Boozer, Cayden Boozer and Nikolas Khamenia is still good for the country’s third best freshman class.
Bringing in a superstar in Cameron Boozer is about the closest that you can get to replacing a talent like Flagg. The 6-foot-9 forward is a dominant interior presence with similar ability to stretch the floor, and he shot over 40% from deep in both his junior and senior seasons. His motor isn’t quite there so as to completely parallel Flagg’s defensive impact, but swapping one superstar stretch forward for another is a dream for most programs.
His brother, Cayden, adds depth at the point guard position. An incredible passer, the 6-foot-4 guard averaged over seven assists per game in his final two years in high school. Boozer protects the ball well and has scoring ability, notably dropping 22 points against Montverde Academy, Flagg’s former team. He will fit in as a facilitator in Duke’s offense.
Lastly, Khamenia rounds out Scheyer’s recruiting class. The 15th-ranked player in the 2025 class is a “do-what-works” player — he can pass, shoot, and plays very naturally. Also 6-foot-9, Khamenia could be the missing starter if Scheyer decides to play a “tall” lineup. A McDonald’s All-American, the Harvard-Westlake product already has glimpses of Flagg, and will continue to improve his athleticism in the summer.
Similar to last year, the Blue Devils will be one of the tallest teams in the country, with no player shorter than 6-foot-4. Despite all the returning talent, the freshmen will certainly make an impact like last year’s team. –Negus/Josh Alms
Filling in the gaps
Scheyer has undeniably done his job on the home front — this offseason already marks the second time in three years that no rotational players elected to leave Durham for the transfer portal. The real point of concern lies in if enough has been done on the recruiting end to pull in top talent from other schools and remain competitive with programs like Kentucky and St. John’s — both of which have reloaded their rosters thanks to reported multimillion-dollar spending on key portal pieces. The expectation is currently for Duke to have six available scholarships to find added depth and fill key roles.
At the moment, the Blue Devils have significant roles that still need to be addressed — James and Gillis out of the picture suggests a need for new veteran presences. Duke could also benefit from added threats on the wing following the departures of Flagg and Kon Knueppel, along with more frontcourt depth due to Khaman Maluach also declaring for the NBA draft.
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Evans is primed for an explosive sophomore season, but the sharpshooter’s smaller frame would leave him undersized in a lot of matchups at the three and might therefore see more success in minutes at the two — leveraging his quick release and ability to navigate screens off the ball to score rather than relying on volume off the dribble. Khamenia, despite plenty of hype, is still a freshman prone to the college basketball learning curve.
Two names to keep an eye on are Cedrick Coward and Dame Sarr. Coward is a physical two-way player that can also space the floor — he led the Big Sky in true shooting in his 2023-24 campaign with Eastern Washington. Sarr is looking to dip into college basketball after seventeen games with FC Barcelona in the Euroleague. The Italian boasts a seven-foot wingspan paired with plus athleticism and strong ball handling ability. Either Coward or Sarr would help fill crucial minutes that Duke currently lacks on the wing via elite scoring potential and length that could help this year’s team replicate the switch-everything defensive success of the 2024-25 squad.
Center depth will be the trickier part to tackle. Ngongba is certainly in position to take a leap — his efficiency and rim protection abilities grew tremendously throughout the tail end of the season — and Brown remains one of the country’s best defenders. The problem is that neither is without injury concerns. Ngongba, of course, missed his senior year of high school and much of the offseason after a foot procedure, and Brown battled shoulder issues throughout the season. If one were to go down, Scheyer would have to run a smaller lineup, likely resulting in out-of-position minutes for Cameron Boozer. He has the body to defend the five, but keeping him in his natural power forward role on the offensive end would make the adjustment to college all the easier. We saw with Kyle Filipowski how those minutes at center could prove challenging for a natural four.
It’s going to be almost impossible to build a roster as dominant as last year’s — KenPom says only 1999 Duke stands above it — but if Scheyer can hit on one of the two wing targets and bring in a serviceable big man, the roster takes a massive leap from settling as one of the top teams in the ACC to being a national title contender once again. –Alms
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