WINSTON-SALEM - Well, they can't all be blowouts.
Riding stellar backcourt play and a defense that stepped up when it counted, the men's basketball team walked into Lawrence Joel Coliseum and took all it could handle from Wake Forest before dispensing of the Demon Deacons, 82-72, last night.
Unlike its previous conference games, Duke (16-1, 5-0 in the ACC) failed to take control of this contest until very late, and the outcome of the game was still in doubt when Wake guard Robert O'Kelley pulled up for a three-pointer with 4:55 remaining in the game to cut Duke's lead to 71-65. But on the Blue Devils' next possession, Shane Battier rebounded a Will Avery miss, then found a wide-open Trajan Langdon standing outside the three-point circle.
Swish. Ballgame.
"There's a little bit of game pressure there," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said, "and the kid doesn't blink. Trajan's a great player."
The bucket by Langdon, who would finish with a game-high 26 points on 7-of-12 shooting, finished a Demon Deacon team that had refused to succumb to Duke's pressure. Every time the Blue Devils made a run, Wake Forest (11-5, 2-2) seemed to answer back.
The first such occurrence came in the first half. A steal by Elton Brand led to a breakaway dunk by Corey Maggette, which capped a 17-4 Duke run to make the score 31-16 with 7:25 remaining. But that was the biggest lead the Blue Devils would have for the entire game, as Wake clawed its way back to an eight-point deficit at halftime with momentum and the crowd on its side.
"I thought we settled down and played respectable basketball," Wake coach Dave Odom said. "I was pleased to be where we were at halftime."
In the opening frame, Langdon and Avery combined for 21 of Duke's 43 points as Wake Forest used a very effective 1-2-2 zone defense to double-team Brand, neutralizing the All-American candidate and holding him to three points and only two field goal attempts.
Avery finished the game with 19 points and five rebounds. The sophomore point guard had five turnovers with only one assist, but did record four steals. In addition, Avery demonstrated his abilities on several acrobatic drives to the basket, taking charge when Brand was being held back.
"We're not going to get 33 points from Elton every night," Avery said. "I realized that me and Trajan would have to pick it up."
Both Krzyzewski and his players were unfazed by the 10-point margin of victory, Duke's smallest since a six-point win over Michigan State Dec. 2, 10 games ago.
"Anytime you win on the road, and we've lost a number of times here, it's a good win," Krzyzewski said. "I'd like to win big, but I'd rather just win."
Chris Carrawell, who contributed 11 points and three assists for his team, seconded his coach's comments.
"This showed us we can win tough games," Carrawell said. "People will ask, 'What's wrong with Duke?' But you won't win every game by 30 points. Going towards March, that's how the game is going to be."
That's how the game was on a night when Duke shot 52.1 percent from the field, held its opponent to 39.7 percent and won the rebounding battle 37-31, yet found itself winning by only six when Battier made his big rebound with less than five minutes to go.
The Battier-to-Langdon three-pointer was the second such combination of the half. Just two minutes earlier, the forward had seemingly helped put the game away by rebounding a Langdon miss and finding the senior outside the arc for three to put Duke up by 10, 69-59, with 6:23 remaining.
"I was just in the right place at the right time," said Battier, who was 0-for-5 from long distance himself. "I thought Trajan did an excellent job both times of reading my position. Hey, if I can't shoot threes, it's much better that he takes them for me."
Those two possessions were called "the keys to the game," by Odom, who despite the loss added, "I thought we did a lot of good things tonight. Our team hung in there. We kept getting a key rebound or a key shot. Something would happen to keep us in the ballgame."
While the 82 points were well below Duke's nation-leading 96.3 points per game average, it did represent an accomplishment against a Wake Forest defense that was fifth in the ACC in holding opponents to 68.7 points per contest. Only once in the team's previous seven games had anyone scored more than 63 points against the Demon Deacons.
"I thought our offense would get a little bit better as the game went along and I was hoping our defense would improve," Odom said. "I think our offense did and our defense did not."
The Blue Devils won despite getting only 12 points from the bench-six from Nate James, four from Maggette and two from Chris Burgess. In total, Duke's starting five accounted for 85.4 percent of the team's scoring and played 83.5 percent of the team's minutes. The fatigue showed in the final two minutes, when the Blue Devils missed six consecutive free throws. But Krzyzewski did not hesitate when asked if he thought he was becoming over-reliant on his starting five.
"No," Krzyzewski said. "No. No. I'm glad I have a starting five to be reliant on. There were years when I didn't."
The win was Duke's 11th in a row, and was the fifth straight road ACC win for the Blue Devils, the team's longest such streak since 1986-87.
Battier said he knew that for that streak to continue, Duke would have to fight through some more tough opponents.
"This is the ACC and there's a reason why it's the toughest conference in America," Battier said. "Those other games were aberrations. This is how it's going to be."
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.