Duke rolls into the Sweet 16 riding the return of center Patrick Ngongba from injury originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
GREENVILLE, S.C. – The occasion that engendered the loudest ovation from the Duke fans, a large portion even standing, was the arrival of Patrick Ngongba to the basketball game at the 16:14 mark of the first half. They greeted him as if he had been gone a year. Perhaps it felt that way.
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“I was trying not to smile too much,” he told reporters.
Devils fans ought to have been most excited, though, by his entry not quite 4 minutes into the second half of their NCAA Tournament second-round game against TCU, because by then it was apparent they might not win without him.
Yeah, the final score was 81-58, and one can surmise from this Duke would have won and advanced to the Sweet 16 with Harry Styles playing center. Ngongba changed the game, though, and he might have the capacity to elevate his team to the NCAA Championship.
Ngongba is one of the few ever to roll into a postgame locker room on two wheels, but his ride wasn’t exactly a Harley. To protect his injured foot, which was encased in a boot for further assurance, he traveled on one of those medical scooters. Every precaution is worthwhile given his obvious value to Duke basketball.
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Guard Isaiah Evans, who scored 17 points, assessed Ngongba’s impact on the team as such: “Every aspect: passing, the interior scoring, another rebounder – and then another sub, another body.”
With Ngongba in the lineup, a 6-11, 250 pound sophomore from Manassas, Va., Duke can remove so much of the playmaking burden from All-American power forward Cameron Boozer, who scored 19 points, grabbed 11 rebounds and passed for 4 assists in the second March Madness game of his career.
MORE:Cam Boozer’s strong second half sparks Duke
Ngongba is such a phenomenal passer that he stuffed four assists into his relatively brief – but enormously impactful – time on the floor.
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“We didn’t know, until he checked in,” Evans said. “He was in working, working on his foot. He missed half of the warmups. So we really didn’t know.”
Ngongba last appeared in a game for the Blue Devils on March 2, when they visited NC State and he contributed 11 points and 5 rebounds in a 29-point destruction of the Wolfpack. They did not lose once without him, and their results included evening the season score against rival North Carolina and claiming the ACC Tournament championship.
Those who were watching, though, saw what they saw.
It was not the same team. Duke averaged 1.17 points per possession over the games he missed, not near the elite number to which the Devils been accustomed, and they allowed a too-comfry 1.05. TCU got only .841 in this game.
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The Devils were less devilish against Florida State in the ACC quarters, when they were fortunate to escape with a 80-79 victory. They surely were not the same Thursday in the March Madness opener against Siena, when they fell into an 11-point halftime deficit that was deeper than any No. 1 seed had experienced in a game against a No. 16 seed – even the two that lost.
Ngongba told The Sporting News he knew that day he would be ready for this one.
His return allowed teammates to play in more comfortable positions. There was no need for freshman wing Nikolas Khamenia, at 6-8, 215, to go anywhere near the power forward spot, because Cameron Boozer no longer had to operate as a center. The Devils got 45 minutes out of their bench; against Siena, it was 33.
MORE:Who would win March Madness all-time bracket battle?
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Ngongba wound up playing just 13 of those minutes, which might be as deceptive a stat as any box score has contained this season. It’s OK, though, because adjacent to that figure, in a column directly to the right, was the number 20. That was his plus/minus rating for the night. And there was no minus sign attached.
Can you imagine that, being worth 20 extra points in that short a time. You probably can, if you saw the game.
TCU just had taken a two-point lead before Ngongba returned to the scene, 40-38 when Micah Robinson nailed a floater through the middle of the lane off a steal by point guard Brock Harding. Not even six minutes later, Duke was ahead by 10 and pondering what to pack for the DC spring weather.
He began the surge with a picturesque pass from the high post to Cameron Boozer for a dunk.
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After two Cameron free throws put the Devils in front TCU’s Xavier Edmonds saw space open for a drive to the middle of the lane. He arrogantly assumed he could advance as far as he wished before attempting a shot, never mind that Ngongba was standing between him and the hoop. That shot was wiped away almost viciously.
When Ngongba rewarded Caden Boozer’s backdoor cut with a perfect pass, Boozer converted the layup and drew a foul for a 3-point play that put the Devils in front for good with 13:43 left. A 26-6 siege from there made the game seem as if it had been comfortable.
“It was awesome,” Cayden Boozer said. “It was really good to see him out there, even if it was 15 minutes or whatever it was. Just having him out there makes us a way better team.”
