5 halftime observations from No. 1 Duke men's basketball's ACC quarterfinal contest with Georgia Tech

No. 1 Duke men’s basketball opens its ACC Tournament slate with a quarterfinal contest against Georgia Tech. After 20 minutes of play, the Blue Devils trail the Yellow Jackets 31-26:

Opening-game jitters

Duke came out of the gates looking sloppy. Khaman Maluach missed a wide-open alley oop, and the Blue Devils couldn’t seem to hang onto the ball. Georgia Tech was the more assertive group, attacking the basket and landing on a lot of the 50-50 balls. Last season, the Blue Devils fell to N.C. State in the ACC Tournament quarterfinals, and head coach Jon Scheyer’s group will need a strong second half to avoid a similar fate this season.

Injury bug

Maliq Brown injured his shoulder in Duke’s 80-62 win against Virginia, but returned for the regular-season finale against North Carolina. However, early in the first half, he reinjured himself and went to the Duke locker room for the remainder of the half. Freshman forward Cooper Flagg appeared to tweak his ankle coming down after a defensive rebound, and while he limped off on his own power to the Duke sideline, he was helped off to the locker room in the final minute of the half.

Lid on the rim

On the first two possessions of the game, the Blue Devils got open looks from deep but could not convert. That became a theme in the early going, with each of their first 13 attempts failing to drop through the net. The problem wasn’t the shot quality; almost every one of Duke’s shots were open looks. On the flip side, forward Duncan Powell got things started for the Yellow Jackets, knocking down three of his first five attempts from deep. The last one of those gave Georgia Tech a 16-8 lead with 11:29 remaining in the first half.

Late burst of energy

The blue-clad fans were all waiting for Duke’s patented run to happen, but they had to wait until the final minutes of the half. The Blue Devils did not even record an assist until the 9:22 mark. Kon Knueppel found Maluach on a pick-and-roll, and the big man waited patiently to finish at the rim. Out of the under-8 media timeout, Powell was forced to take an ill-advised shot, and two more stops gave the offense some breathing room. Duke had a 5:39 scoring drought in the middle of the half and could not cut into the gap. However, two Isaiah Evans threes and Patrick Ngongba II buckets helped make the deficit single digits. In the first half, the Blue Devils shot 37.9% from the field and 12.5% from deep.

Player of the half: Baye Ndongo

Ndongo continued to be a thorn in the Blue Devils’ side. The lanky 6-foot-9 forward made life difficult for the Blue Devil defenders, crashing the board and finishing tough shots at the basket with ease. He filled the stat sheet with 11 points, three rebounds and three assists in the first 20 minutes, including a tough and-one bucket. At the 6:55 mark, he denied Flagg at the rim. After a relatively slow start to the season, Ndongo has recorded double figures in 13 straight contests, including a 16-point, four-block outing in the first round against Virginia.