Rhode Island's Jimmy Baron quieted the crowd inside Cameron Indoor Stadium all afternoon Sunday, until Kyle Singler and Jon Scheyer made the Cameron crowd thunder in approval again.

Singler and Scheyer scored Duke's last 12 points-including six consecutive free throws with less than a minute remaining-and kept Duke fans on their feet as the No. 8 Blue Devils pulled out an 82-79 nailbiter over the Rams in an unexpected test between 2K Sports Classic games.

Singler and Scheyer combined for 44 points and paced the team in virtually every offensive category. Singler led the way with 23 points, including three 3-pointers, five rebounds and five assists, while Scheyer put up 21 and finished a perfect 13-for-13 from the charity stripe.

"I don't know how much we enjoyed it," head coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "It was one of those things like skydiving or bungee jumping, where you are supposed to enjoy this, but then I did it, and I really didn't enjoy it. But afterwards, you are going to be cool and say, 'Man that was cool. I really loved all that.' I'm not sure you go in a game like this while the game is going on and say, 'Wow, I'm enjoying this.'

"I thought I was playing Spain the way they were hitting that damn thing. I tried to put Dwyane Wade in, and nobody came in. Thank goodness that Jon Scheyer and Kyle did their impersonations real well."

It would have taken a superhuman performance, though, to match the one Baron posted for the Rams (1-1). He finished with 24 points, including a stretch in which he hit seven 3-pointers in a row in the second half. In the end, though, Singler's defensive effort proved to be Baron's kryptonite. With his team trailing by one and six seconds left, Baron forced a mid-range jumper over Singler.

The Blue Devils (3-0) grabbed the rebound, and Scheyer made two free throws with three seconds left to put Duke up three. Baron's magic touch finally ran out when his half-court heave at the buzzer slammed off the glass.

"I love those kinds of games," said Singler, who has led Duke in scoring every game. "When I needed to get that stop on Baron, personally, I knew I was going to stop him, but you don't want to see that ball go in. It was a very exciting game to play in.... Those are the kind of games you want to play in."

Despite the final score, Duke played from behind for most of the contest. Down 12 late in the first half, Gerald Henderson took matters into his own hands and electrified the rest of his team and the crowd with an acrobatic dunk. Singler fed him the ball in the left corner from the top of the key, and Henderson flew through the air all the way to the rim. Duke followed on his heels and retained the momentum for the rest of the half to close on an 11-0 run and go into the locker room only down by one.

"The last four minutes of the first half and the last four or five minutes of the game, we had to play outstanding basketball to put us in a position to win because of what they did," Krzyzewski said. "I really respect what they did. That was a great game for us to be in."

"You can't practice a game like this. The best game played so far in college basketball maybe for the next week or so, maybe until New York. For us to be in it, that's a good thing."

One Duke player who was not 100 percent for this game, though, was senior captain Greg Paulus. Paulus took a hard charge on his right arm Friday, and it swelled up to the point that he could not move his fingers, Krzyzewski said. After icing for a night, Paulus was able to partially close his hand Saturday, and recovered enough to participate in the shoot-around before the game and see 11 minutes of action.

"That kid played with a lot of guts today because, really, he could not [make a fist] less than 40 hours ago," Krzyzewski said. "And he still wanted to play. I would have used him more with Nolan. I just felt that he was going on guts."

All of the Blue Devils relied on their guts at some point in the game. Whether it was Henderson flying through the air, Singler driving to the hole or Scheyer nailing free throw after free throw, Duke needed all of it to top an opponent which almost shocked the Blue Devils.

"We knew this would be a tough game, especially in between New York," Krzyzewski said. "But our guys, believe me, we did not look ahead. Our games were ready to play. I'm not down on our team, that team played great. If we looked bad, because we probably did a number of times, it was because of how well they played, not how poorly they played. It was all on them. They were that good today.

"They were deserving of winning, but we were too."