Preview: Wofford at No. 6 Duke

The first big game of Duke’s season didn’t go the Blue Devils’ way.

They’re going to have more big ones, two of them sooner rather than later — just not immediately.

Duke plays host to Wofford on Saturday and is favored by 20 on KenPom over the Southern Conference team. The Terriers’ only win this season was against a Division II team.

This next one should be a get-right game for the Blue Devils before they head back into the gauntlet of their non-conference schedule.

“We’ve got a long season to go and I feel more optimistic tonight, losing, than I did even before” playing Kentucky on Tuesday night, coach Jon Scheyer said.

“Because you find out in this game the character of your team, the heart they have. And this team has got a lot of heart,” he added.

After Saturday’s game, three of Duke’s next four games are at Arizona, against Kansas in Las Vegas, and at home against Auburn in the ACC-SEC Challenge. And after playing host to Auburn, the Blue Devils play their ACC opener, which is at Louisville — hardly the pushover it’s been for the last two seasons and rejuvenated with a new coach and roster.

It’s a roundabout discussion to talk about Duke losing to Kentucky and how many of the Blue Devils’ issues down the stretch are solvable against how many of them cause a reevaluation of things.

Duke isn’t going to win many big games — or even games, for that matter — with one player making a field goal for the last 10 minutes. That was the burden for 17-year-old Cooper Flagg on Tuesday night; Mason Gillis had a tip-in with 10:51 left and for the rest of the game, non-Flagg Blue Devils shot a combined 0-for-8.

Duke also lost the edges it had in the first half, going from outscoring Kentucky 28-6 in the paint to the Wildcats holding a 20-18 advantage, and having significant edges in points off turnovers (11-0) and fast-break points (8-1) both swing to Kentucky’s favor (9-4 for the Wildcats in both categories for the second half).

Where this comes around, though, is figuring that Duke’s freshmen will learn; it’s what Scheyer is banking on. How many more times is Kon Knueppel going to be 5-for-20 in a game? Or how many halves will Duke have in which it shoots 1-for-11 on 3-pointers? How often is Khaman Maluach going to experience cramps? How much changes if Sion James doesn’t suffer a shoulder injury with 12½ minutes left?

It’s a long season in which a lot of those questions, if they’re not already answered, are going to be resolved in short order.

The answers just won’t come Saturday.

Here’s what to know ahead of Saturday’s game:

Time: 12 p.m.

Location: Cameron Indoor Stadium.

TV: ACC Network.

Series; last meeting: Duke leads 7-0; Duke won 86-57 in Dec. 2019, with Joey Baker scoring a game-high 22 points off the bench.

Records: Wofford 1-2; Duke 2-1.

Stat to watch: 96/109.

The first number is how many 2-point shots Wofford has taken this season; the second is how many 3s Wofford has taken.

It’s easy to figure the Terriers will be launching from long range in this one.

If the track record isn’t evidence enough, Duke’s size advantage in the frontcourt with Maluach, Flagg and Maliq Brown should further push Wofford’s offense away from Duke’s paint.

That’s going to be a good test for the Blue Devils.

Kentucky was 10-for-25 on 3-pointers against Duke. The Blue Devils had gone 21 straight games without allowing double-digit 3s, dating back to last season’s loss to Pittsburgh.

Looking ahead: Arizona has made eight 3s in each of its two games so far and Kansas made 11 in its season opener, and has made 11 combined in its last two games. Duke’s 3-point defense might be under the most intense scrutiny when the Blue Devils play Auburn, which has the No. 2-ranked offense in the country (per KenPom) and has made 29 3-pointers across its first three games.

Matchup to watch: Duke’s freshmen vs. hydration.

Facetious, yes — but only to an extent.

After Flagg exited Duke’s first two games with cramps, Maluach suffered through them in the second half against Kentucky.

It is, understandably, a frustrating topic for Scheyer.

“It’s concerning,” he said after Tuesday night’s game. “I think part of it is we have young bodies. … We’ve got to help these guys. We’re not just trying to dip our toes in the water. We need Cooper to play a lot and Khaman … so obviously, that’s something we’ve got to take a hard look at.”

Terrier to watch: Guard/wing Corey Tripp (No. 10).

Wofford’s leading scorer from a year ago didn’t exactly pad the stats in the Terriers’ season-opening blowout of Division II Erskine College — seven points, 0-3 on 3s — but has back-to-back 15-point games since then.

That’s in line with where Tripp was last season, scoring 15.6 points per game. That earned the senior second-team All-Southern Conference honors.

The 6-3, 195-pounder has seemingly — albeit with a small sample size — improved his long-range shooting this year. Tripp was a 27.7% 3-point shooter last season; after his oh-fer in the opener, he’s made 6 of 11 3s. He’s also a decent facilitator, with 13 assists and three turnovers this season; Tripp had 108 assists and 67 turnovers last year.

Blue Devil to watch: Guard Caleb Foster (No. 1).

Not exactly a dearth of bounce-back candidates to choose from.

And if the question was which Blue Devil would be worth watching in pre-game activities, that would obviously be James to see how he’s managing his injured right shoulder.

But we’re going with Foster, who was 2-for-9 from the field and scored four points against Kentucky.

Wofford’s guards aren’t going to be confused with Kentucky’s anytime soon. But regardless of competition, you’ll want to see Foster hit some shots — preferably early — to regain some confidence against the Terriers.

The 6-5, 202-pound sophomore scored 11 points in each of Duke’s first two games. Foster also had a rough outing in Duke’s first big game of last season, going scoreless in 13 minutes against Arizona; he followed that up with what still stands as his career high, an 18-point game against Michigan State.

What’s on deck: Duke gets almost a week off but its next two games are going to tell a lot of the story about how the Blue Devils’ non-conference slate is judged.

Duke is at Arizona on Friday night, the completion of a home-and-home series against the Wildcats that saw them come to Durham and win early last season. And Duke will stay out west to play Kansas on Nov. 26.

Wofford also doesn’t play again until Friday, when the Terriers go to the Cream City Challenge in Milwaukee for three games in three days, starting with Friday’s game against University of St. Thomas.

KenPom prediction: Duke wins 84-64.

What a Duke loss looks like: Fire alarms in Cameron going off … and whatever other warning bells that could be sounded.

This isn’t an unlosable game for the Blue Devils but it’s another one that a lot of things have to go wrong for them to lose. We’re talking Wofford shooting 50% on 3s and Duke shooting 20%, or there being a turnover differential in the double digits — stuff like that would get Duke beat.

What a Duke win looks like: Conversely, the formula for Duke to win this game has some variance.

The Blue Devils could rain down 3s on Wofford, as they did to Army the last time they were at home. Or they can pound it inside and use their size advantage in the paint.

What you’ll want to see — what Scheyer probably wants to see — is a defense that runs Wofford off of the 3-point line, taking away the Terriers’ strength. And you’ll want to see Duke’s offense click back into gear after the 1-for-11 3-point showing in the second half against Kentucky.

As long as those things happen, it’ll be a relatively stress-free game for Duke.