Fab freshmen, top transfers — and Cooper Flagg: 5 things to know about Duke basketball

Knowing he had a supremely talented incoming freshman in Cooper Flagg, Duke coach Jon Scheyer rebuilt the Blue Devils last spring.

Now, the 6-foot-9 Flagg is in a Duke uniform. NBA scouts regularly attend Blue Devils practices to see the player many believe will be the No. 1 overall pick in next summer’s NBA Draft.

Around Flagg, Duke has two returning guards with starting experience in 6-5 junior Tyrese Proctor and 6-5 sophomore Caleb Foster.

Three transfers, 6-9 forward Maliq Brown, 6-7 forward Sion James and 6-6 forward Mason Gillis, provide the experience Scheyer sought in the roster turnover.

Plus there’s plenty of other talent among the freshmen class that comprised the nation’s No. 1 incoming recruiting class.

After compiling all that talent, Scheyer’s job is to win and win big. To do so, the team needs cohesion.

“We want to be a team that’s tough and together,” Scheyer said. “That’s the most important thing. You have to have the right people. I feel we do. These guys have been consistent with the work and now we have to take steps forward with understanding strengths and weaknesses of each other and how to put in a little bit more structure and how to develop that.

The people, the character of the guys on the team, they’re ready for that. I’ve been proud to be their coach.”

On the way to forming those bonds, Scheyer has to decide who will play where while keeping the team together.

“It’s part of the blessing. It’s part of the hard part,” Scheyer said. “Where everybody wants to play, and you can’t play everybody right? But I can tell you is, the guys that will end up playing are rewarded by what they do in practice. It’s not gonna be based on recruiting rankings. It’s not gonna be based on mock drafts. It’s not based on any of that. It’s based on what makes Duke the best right now and what you’ve earned.”

After producing back-to-back 27-9 seasons, winning an ACC championship in his first year as Duke’s coach and advancing to the Elite 8 in last spring’s NCAA Tournament, Scheyer carries expectations of even more this season.

The Blue Devils are set to open the regular season Nov. 4 at home against Maine.

Here are five things to know about this season’s team:

Cooper Flagg is super versatile

Both offensively and defensively, Flagg is comfortable playing anywhere on the court. He’s displayed the ability to protect the rim defensively while also having the agility to guard players on the perimeter.

Offensively, he’s capable of handling the ball out front and getting the team into its half-court sets and hitting 3-pointers. His size, though, means he can get in the lane and score with bigger players.

“I don’t really have a spot that I’m most comfortable,” Flagg said. “Kind of positionless. Do whatever I need to do, just do my job.”

The beauty of having 7-2 center Khaman Maluach and the 6-9 Brown on the roster means Duke doesn’t need Flagg to simply be a post player. He’s free to make plays with all his skills.

That means there’s a strong likelihood Duke’s short list of triple-doubles (five) could grow. RJ Barrett (2019) and Wendell Moore (2021) recorded the most recent ones. Flagg’s ability to score, rebound, pass and block shots means he could join the list that also includes Art Heyman (1963), Gene Banks (1978) and Shelden Williams (2006).

Freshmen class is more than Flagg

Flagg is the main guy the NBA scouts want to watch, but Duke’s freshman class has multiple future pro players, it appears.

Maluach and 6-7 forward Kon Knueppel are also popping up on mock drafts as lottery selections next summer.

Maluach, from South Sudan, comes with limited basketball experience compared to his American teammates. He only took up the sport in 2019 at age 13. But he has experience beyond his years, having played for his home country in the Paris Olympics last summer as well as training at NBA Academy Africa.

Shot blocking and rebounding are things he’ll be able to contribute immediately, along with scoring from the paint.

Knueppel had a terrific summer after arriving on campus and working with his new teammates. Already a reliable 3-point shooter, he’s a sturdy defender and is developing as a driving scorer as well.

He quickly worked his way into Duke’s playing rotation and is in line to be a starter.

Flagg, his roommate, said he only knew about Knueppel’s game from all-star games and YouTube highlights. But Knueppel has opened his eyes.

“I knew he was very skilled because he shoots it very well,” Flagg said. “I didn’t know how good he was with using his body. He uses his body really well. Getting the paint. Bumping people back to the basket, a little bit of mid post. He really excels in that area.”

Duke needs more from Tyrese Proctor

In what seems like the blink of an eye, Proctor has gone from the youngest Blue Devil to the player with the most experience in a Duke uniform.

When Jeremy Roach transferred to Baylor and Jaylen Blakes left for Stanford, the last two players who played for Mike Krzyzewski departed the program. That means Proctor, a junior and returning captain, is in an important role two years after joining Duke a year early by reclassifying into the 2022 recruiting class that entered school for Scheyer’s first season as head coach.

“The season is such a roller coaster,” Proctor said. “You can get lost in losses or wins, like big wins, bad losses. So I think just staying level head, I’ve done a great job of that. And I’m the head of the ship this year. So I gotta make sure I’m level headed the whole year.”

After entering school as an indifferent defensive player, Proctor has grown into one of the ACC’s top perimeter, on-ball defenders. Duke will certainly need that from him this season.

His scoring has proven inconsistent, though. Proctor averaged 9.4 points as a freshman and 10.5 last season as a sophomore while dealing with an ankle injury and a concussion. Despite that, his shooting improved as a sophomore when he made 35% of his 3-pointers and 42% of his shots overall.

Duke needs to see both of those numbers take another jump this season as Proctor figures to get some open shots as defenders focus on Flagg and Knueppel.

Proctor could find himself playing an off-guard role if Flagg is handling the ball in half-court sets. That could set him up to have a season like Quinn Cook did in 2014-15, when he averaged 15.3 points and 2.6 assists for Duke’s NCAA championship squad.

If he Proctor plays like that, Duke will be tough to beat.

“He’s shown flashes of being as good of a perimeter defender as there is in the country,” Scheyer said. “My challenge for him is to do it every game, all the time. We’ve asked him to do so much for us, where his scoring and shooting can take a back seat at times. I want him to not pass up any shots. When he’s got open threes, to take him. His shooting is a big-time weapon.”

The importance of transfers

Scheyer brought in Gillis, James and Brown, and Cameron Sheffield, to a lesser extent, to add age, experience and moxie to a team that will also relay on those outstanding freshmen.

Gillis was the Big Ten sixth man of the year at Purdue last season while making 46.8% of his 3-pointers. Brown led the ACC in steals as a sophomore at Syracuse. James started 107 games, while playing in 114, and averaged 34 minutes per contest over the last four seasons at Tulane, where he scored 14 points per game last season.

All are the type of rugged, older players who helped eliminate Duke from the last two NCAA tournaments short of its Final Four goal.

“All three of those guys have provided great toughness and unselfishness, incredibly low maintenance,” Scheyer said. “The fact that they all come from different programs and are all successful in different ways. But it’s brought a chip in different ways, and that’s been refreshing, great to see.”

Duke must have a championship defense

As fun as buzzer-beating jump shots and slam dunks are to watch, defense is supremely important to a team’s championship chances.

In the KenPom.com analysis era, starting with the 1996-97 season, only one team (Baylor in 2021) has won the NCAA championship finishing outside the top 20 in defensive efficiency.

It’s why Scheyer says he wants defense to be this team’s first, second and third priorities.

Maluach gives Duke a rim protector. Brown and Flagg can also help in the paint. But what Scheyer wants to see this season is more perimeter steals that turn into fast-break opportunities for Duke’s offense.

That’s where Proctor will come in, along with Caleb Foster, Knueppel, James and Gillis. Flagg can help there, too, with his perimeter defense..

“We can have a few different looks, which I think is important, Scheyer said. “But creating a creating an identity has been the most important thing for us as a staff, and the versatility, switching, clearly, is something that jumps off the page.”