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Duke's Jabari Parker (1) guards Michigan's Derrick Walton Jr. during the first half in Durham, N.C., on Tuesday night.
(AP Photo | Gerry Broome)
DURHAM, N.C. -- John Beilein was in his first year at Michigan back on Dec. 8, 2007. The Wolverines weren’t very good -- bad, actually -- bumbling along toward a messy 10-22 season, and heading into the heated hornet’s nest known as Cameron Indoor Stadium.
Duke was undefeated, ranked sixth in the country, and operating in a different atmosphere than Michigan. The Blue Devils showed it. It was over before it started that day in 2007. A 28-point loss left Beilein saying, “We didn't play well, we learned a lot and we came home alive.”
Beilein and Michigan returned to Cameron Indoor on Tuesday night.
They didn’t play well, again.
Behind 53 points from the trio of Jabari Parker, Quinn Cook and Rodney Hood, the 10th-ranked Blue Devils sent the Wolverines back to Ann Arbor looking for life after a 79-69 loss.
No. 22 Michigan (5-3) did itself few favors. The threesome supposed to counter Parker, Cook and Hood -- that of Nik Stauskas, Mitch McGary and Glenn Robinson -- combined for just 27 points.
The Wolverines were instead led by Caris LeVert. The ever-emerging sophomore guard scored 20 of his 24 points in the second half. He was the only gear working as U-M tried to erase a 10-point halftime deficit.
LeVert was solid, but no single player was going to be enough to overcome Duke (7-2) --
a team that hasn't lost at Cameron Indoor to a visiting non-conference team since St. John's turned the trick on Feb. 26, 2000.
The Blue Devils rarely lose at home because they counter jabs with punches.
While Parker, the Blue Devils' dynamic freshman, and Hood carried the heavy load, senior guard Andre Dawkins landed the night's two biggest punches.
Following a LeVert basket-and-a-foul conversion, Duke had a 46-40 lead with 9:01 left. Dawkins sank back-to-back 3-pointers, giving the Blue Devils a 52-40 lead with 8:05 left.
The Wolverines landed on their back. They never cut the lead under 10 again. They trailed by as many as 18.
Michigan finished the night 25-of-56 from the field, 3-of-13 on 3s.
Stauskas, the Wolverines' leading scorer at 20.3 points per game, returned to the lineup and started after sitting out of Michigan’s win over Coppin State on Friday with an ankle sprain. He was greeted back by Duke guards Tyler Thornton and Matt Jones, who face-guarded Stauskas all evening and shut him down.
McGary finished with 15 points and 14 rebounds.
A 32-22 halftime deficit could have, and probably should have, been worse for Michigan. Stauskas, McGary and Robinson combined for just 10 points on 3-of-12 shooting and the Wolverines, as a whole, made 8-of-26 shot attempts and just one 3-pointer.
Leading 12-9 early, the Blue Devils used a 9-0 run capped by a transition layup by Parker to open the game up. Michigan cut into the lead with a 20-foot jumper by McGary, two layups by Caris LeVert and an ally-oop from Stauskas to Robinson, but a 3-pointer by Duke's Tyler Thorton pushed the lead back to 10 at half.
The night offered Michigan an opportunity for a marquee early season win. It ended as U-M’s third defeat of the year, joining losses to Iowa State and Charlotte.
The Wolverines' remaining non-conference slate features a home date with No. 2 Arizona, a meeting with unranked Stanford and some also-ran games against Houston Baptist and Holy Cross.
It marked Michigan’s 10th loss to Duke in the programs’ last 11 meetings. The Blue Devils now lead the all-time series 8-29.
Highlights
-- Levert matched his career high of 24 points and his 20 second-half points were the only thing keeping Michigan from succumbing to an embarrassing blowout.
-- Stauskas' productivity was vastly limited, but getting him back on the floor was, at the minimum, a small brightspot for U-M.
Lowlights
-- Michigan was out-worked on the glass most of the evening. Duke's final rebounding margin of 32-31 was skewed by the final five minutes of the game.
-- While trying to finding the fixings for a comeback in the second half, Michigan allowed Duke to shoot 60.0 percent from the field (15-25).