DURHAM – More than Jon Scheyer wanted Duke to win these two home games against decent mid-major teams, he wanted his team to take a step forward.

Of course, the goal is for that to translate to wins. That was already the case against Charlotte on Saturday and it was followed up with the Blue Devils’ 89-68 win over Hofstra on Tuesday night at Cameron Indoor Stadium.

“The blueprint is set after these last two games,” Scheyer said. “You have to continue to adjust and adapt to who you’re playing, what the game plan is. But in terms of the preparation, the collective effort, the fight —

“And tonight was great because it wasn’t perfect for us in the first half.”

The No. 21 Blue Devils (7-3) trailed by five with four minutes left in the first half, having gone back-and-forth with the Pride’s high-octane offense.

Duke closed the first half on a 12-2 run, and that’s why the Blue Devils took a five-point lead into halftime instead of a five-point deficit.

Hofstra (6-4) scored the first points of the second half, and then Duke went on runs of 11-2 and 9-2 to open this thing up. In that first run, Kyle Filipowski drilled corner 3s on back-to-back possessions — part of his stat-stuffing 28-point, 12-rebound, eight-assist, three-block performance.

“I think it’s been a great two last games,” the sophomore center said. “I think we just need to keep that same mindset going into next week. We could very easily get satisfied and go away from what we’ve been doing well, but we’ve definitely prioritized being selfless with each other, doing the right things. When we do that, we’re the best team in the country.”

Filipowski hit his scoring season-high on the last shot he took, a top-of-the-key 3 that put Duke up 71-55 inside of the 8-minute mark. That made him 4-for-7 from behind the arc; he was 1-for-12 on 3s in the previous four games.

That long-distance shooting, and Filipowski’s assist total, help illustrate where Duke made the biggest strides since losing the ACC opener at Georgia Tech.

Duke was 15-for-56 on 3-pointers against Southern Indiana, Arkansas and GT; the Blue Devils were 21 of 40 against Charlotte and Hofstra. The makes have come because of Duke’s improved ball movement — in those three previous games, Duke had 34 assists on 79 field goals.

In the last two games, Duke had 37 assists on 57 field goals.

“I just felt these last two games, you don’t know who’s scoring. Guys are just making the right pass,” Scheyer said. “It comes back around to you. And, you know, I’ll take a lot of responsibility for that because teams have played us differently.

“I’ve had to do a better job of positioning them where their strengths are shown, but also what reads are there based on what teams are showing.”

Duke had 85 points on 64 possessions before Scheyer substituted liberally for the last few minutes, when the game was in hand. That 1.33 points per possession clip is tied for the second-best of the season, behind 1.35 in the season opener against Dartmouth.

Along with Filipowski’s marksmanship, Jeremy Roach had 19 points on 7-for-11 shooting, including 3-for-5 on 3s. He matched Filipowski with eight assists (and had zero turnovers, while Filipowski had seven).

“How hard we were playing, these are probably the two hardest games that we played,” Roach said. “We’ve just gotta sustain that, keep going on down the road.”

This was a tune-up not just to pair with Saturday’s win against Charlotte, for the Blue Devils to find the blueprint Scheyer was talking about. Duke has seven days before it plays No. 6 Baylor, currently unbeaten, at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 20.

Defense fits in here too, and in looking at Tuesday night’s game that had more to do with the second half.

Hofstra had four turnovers in the first half and 10 in the second, leading to 20 of Duke’s 45 second-half points.

“I think there are still things to improve on, but I think we definitely figured some things out in these last two (games),” sophomore forward Mark Mitchell said.

Hofstra’s Darlinstone Dubar hit five 3s in the first half, taking advantage of some hand-down closeouts and catching fire from the right wing. He hit two more 3s in the second half and finished with 24 points and eight rebounds.

Tyler Thomas, who entered the game fourth in the country at 23.6 points per game, had 18 points on 8-for-16 shooting.

TIP-INS: Duke was without point guard Tyrese Proctor and center Christian Reeves for the second straight game, both out with ankle injuries. Scheyer said Proctor is able to do “stationary shooting,” but said he has “no movement at this point.” Scheyer also said Duke is going to be “very cautious” with its sophomore point guard. … Mitchell scored 14 points, meaning Duke is 20-2 when he scores in double figures across the last two seasons. He also had six rebound and two assists. … Jared McCain also scored in double figures (13), hitting 3 of 4 3-pointers. That means over the last two games, he had 34 points on 12-for-21 shooting.