OMAHA, Neb.—Marvin Bagley III didn't need to look at the halftime box score. He knew.
Zero—that's how many rebounds the 6-foot-11 freshman grabbed in the first 20 minutes of Thursday night's Sweet 16 contest.
It was not a different Bagley from the one that dropped a pair of back-to-back 30-point, 15-rebound performances back in November. He was simply a first-year player finally getting a heaping spoonful of March Madness.
Yet on a night when the Phoenix native broke another Duke scoring record, it was Bagley's relentless work on the glass that propelled the Blue Devils past Syracuse and put them within one victory of another Final Four appearance.
"We just had to go for them," Bagley said. "Obviously, [we struggled] in the first half, and that wasn’t good at all, so we just had to try to get position and just go for every one we could. They started to come to us in the second half, and we did a good job with that."
For a Duke front line with Bagley, Wendell Carter Jr., Marques Bolden and Javin DeLaurier—all 6-foot-10 or taller—rebounding has rarely been a problem. The Blue Devils not only lead the nation in offensive rebound percentage at 39.2 percent, but they also rank fourth in total boards, with Bagley averaging more than 11 per game.
At the break, however, the Orange were controlling the rebound battle. Syracuse led 19-12, topping Duke on the glass on both ends of the court, and second-chance opportunities allowed the underdog Orange to hang within seven in the early going.
All the way back in October at ACC media day, Coach K told reporters, "Hopefully, we'll be a great rebounding team."
If there were ever a time for that prophecy to fulfill itself, a matchup with the tallest team in all of college basketball was the perfect opportunity.
"That was going to determine if we were going to win or lose," Carter said. "The rebound battle is very key, especially against a good team like Syracuse.... We just weren’t talking, and when we’re not talking, we’re not active, we can’t get to the board. So we picked our talk up in the second half and we started getting those boards."
Although the numbers might not suggest it, the Blue Devils flipped the rebounding script in the final 20 minutes. Duke grabbed 21 to the Orange's 18, and offensive rebounds were the biggest story. Six of Bagley's seven boards were on that end of the floor, and Carter grabbed back-to-back offensive rebounds at a crucial juncture in the second half.
"They are just so long and athletic. We weren’t in position at times in the first to get the rebounds that they were able to get," Bagley said. "That was kind of a tough thing to come out and adjust to, but we did a great job with that in the second half of getting better position and reading where the ball was going to hit off of the rim."
Of course, the Blue Devils needed their big men for more than just rebounding.
After Syracuse failed to break the 60-point mark in five of its last six games, the Orange found efficient offense from the get-go at the CenturyLink Center. Syracuse kept going inside for points—it got 30 total in the painted area—and though Duke tallied just two blocks, Carter and Bagley were effective in limiting any further damage the Orange might have hoped to inflict.
And the two combined for 36 points, more than half of the Blue Devil offense, as Duke struggled to get anything going from beyond the arc. A Bagley tip-in also pushed the big man past Jabari Parker for the most points in a freshman season by any Blue Devil.
"I didn’t even know," Bagley said. "I’m just blessed, man. I’m just happy that we got the win. Good accomplishment, but we’re not done yet. We’ve got a lot more games to play, and that’s what we’re focused on."
From the start of the season, there was an expectation that this Duke team might be different than in years past. The Blue Devils weren't going to be dominant 3-point shooters—instead, they would have to rely on their size and athleticism to be a defensive and rebounding force.
If Duke doesn't shoot well Sunday against Kansas, it very well may see its season come to a close. But if the Blue Devil big men have anything to say about it, an off day from distance will mean just another opportunity to show their worth.
"We just act like we’ve been here before," Carter said. "We just come out—not too antsy, don’t get so far out of yourself. Just stay inside of yourself and do what you’re supposed to do and what you’ve been working on. The chips will fall where they’re supposed to."
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Twitter: @mpgladstone13
A junior from just outside Philadelphia, Mitchell is probably reminding you how the Eagles won the Super Bowl this year and that the Phillies are definitely on the rebound. Outside of The Chronicle, he majors in Economics, minors in Statistics and is working toward the PJMS certificate, in addition to playing trombone in the Duke University Marching Band. And if you're getting him a sandwich with beef and cheese outside the state of Pennsylvania, you best not call it a "Philly cheesesteak."