Friday, November 9, 2007

8. Duke

2007 ACC Record: 8-8, t-6th place
Projected 2008 Record: 7-9 (1066 PARTOBS*, .414 Raw W%)

Duke's 2008 schedule is neutral. Five of their eight games against the top of the conference will be played in Cameron Indoor Stadium, but that is offset by playing only one game each against the projected bottom three teams, and all of those games are on the road.

Projected Player Contributions:

It's become conventional wisdom that the Blue Devils will be better off without Josh McRoberts, but I'm not buying it. McRoberts was the best defensive player on a team that relied heavily on its defense to win games, and it's hard to see how the Devils will be able to make up for the 58 points McRoberts was worth defensively in the conference season.

With freshmen Kyle Singler and Taylor King likely to log significant minutes for the Devils, it's likely that Duke will try to make up most of that deficit on the offensive end of the floor. Whether Mike Krzyzewski elects to return to the up-tempo pace that Duke teams played at throughout most of the last decade or spends another year playing at a Big Ten pace, the pressure will be on the offense to improve its efficiency.

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