Duke earns 5-seed in NCAA tournament
ACC champion Blue Devils will head to Orlando for first- and second-round games
Duke is headed to Orlando, Fla., for the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament, hoping to keep rolling as it has for the past four weeks.
The Blue Devils were awarded the 5-seed in the East region and will play 12th-seeded Oral Roberts in the first round on Thursday.
That news was announced Sunday night, less than 24 hours after Duke’s win over Virginia punched the Blue Devils’ ticket as ACC champions in the Greensboro Coliseum, which is also playing host to NCAA tournament games this week.
If Duke wins, it’ll face either fourth-seeded Tennessee or 13th-seeded Louisiana on Saturday. Reaching the Sweet 16 would mean a trip to New York City.
While it never felt like Duke was in danger of missing the NCAA tournament, Saturday’s announcement of a 5-seed didn’t come into focus until the last four weeks.
Duke enters the NCAA tournament riding a nine-game winning streak, the last three of which netted the Blue Devils their 22nd ACC championship. All three of those wins — 96-69 over Pittsburgh, 85-78 over Miami and 59-49 over Virginia — came against teams in the NCAA tournament.
The Blue Devils never won more than four straight games until this past stretch. Duke had key neutral-court wins over Xavier and Iowa, and losses to Kansas and Purdue, in the first 11 games of the season.
Duke was 8-6 in an oversaturated ACC after an overtime loss at Virginia on Feb. 11 — a game in which it was determined ACC officials incorrectly waved off a foul of Kyle Filipowski on the final play of regulation.
Since then, Duke has reeled off its longest winning streak since the 2019-20 season, when that team won nine games spanning the New Year.
The Blue Devils head into the NCAA tournament with a clean bill of health, something they’ve had for past several weeks after it was an issue for a few key players early. Since freshman Dariq Whitehead returned from a four-game absence in the loss at Virginia, Duke has had its full complement of players available.
Duke is one of five ACC teams in the field. Virginia — which Duke beat for the ACC crown — is a 4-seed, Miami is a 5-seed, N.C. State is an 11-seed and Pittsburgh is also an 11-seed, facing Mississippi State in a First Four game in Dayton.