Duke Blue Devils Pull Away From TCU Horned Frogs In Second Half With Help From Cameron Boozer To Punch Ticket To Sweet 16

Coming off a terrifyingly close call against 16-seed Siena earlier in the week, the No. 1 overall seed Duke Blue Devils walked onto the floor in Greenville, South Carolina, looking to make a statement. Instead, they found themselves in an absolute rock fight with a scrappy TCU squad. For about 25 minutes of game time, the Horned Frogs genuinely made you believe that a massive upset was brewing.

But this is March. And more importantly, this is Duke. When the lights got blindingly bright, the Blue Devils remembered exactly who they are, flipping a switch to obliterate TCU 81-58 and punch their ticket to the Sweet 16 for the third consecutive year.

A First Half Built For the Underdog

Jamie Dixon’s TCU team didn’t show up to Greenville just to ask for autographs. They came to play bully ball. The Horned Frogs turned the first half into a physical, grinding affair that completely threw the Blue Devils out of their rhythm.

TCU’s Micah Robinson was a menace, eventually tallying 18 points and grabbing tough boards, while Duke’s offense looked disjointed. For a terrifying stretch, the Blue Devils couldn’t buy a bucket from the floor. At halftime, Duke clung to a measly 38-34 lead, built almost entirely on the back of free throws and defensive grit from Maliq Brown.

Worse yet? Cameron Boozer, the unanimous AP All-American freshman, was practically a ghost. Boozer managed just 2 points on one shot attempt in the opening half. You could practically feel the collective anxiety radiating from the Duke bench. When TCU came out firing in the second half, taking a 40-38 lead just four minutes in, the upset alerts started flashing nationwide.

Cameron Boozer and the Second-Half Awakening

Then, the sleeping giant finally woke up. Whatever Head Coach Jon Scheyer said in the huddle during that early second-half timeout deserves to be framed in the Cameron Indoor Stadium lobby. Coming out of the break, Duke ripped off a devastating 26-6 run that spanned nine agonizing minutes for TCU fans. The centerpiece of that run? Cameron Boozer playing like a man utterly possessed.

Boozer shook off his first-half slump with a vengeance, completing back-to-back and-one opportunities and reminding the Horned Frogs that he is, in fact, an absolute nightmare to defend. He finished the night with 19 points, 11 rebounds, and a swagger that completely deflated the opposition.

The Return Of the Big Man: Patrick Ngongba II

You can’t talk about that second-half explosion without talking about the return of Patrick Ngongba II. After missing five games with foot soreness, the sophomore center checked in and immediately changed the geometry of the court.

Ngongba didn’t just provide rim protection; he played the role of a giant point guard. His brilliant high-low feeds directly to Boozer resulted in easy, momentum-shifting slams. It was a beautiful display of big-to-big passing that completely broke TCU’s defensive shell.

Isaiah Evans Shoots the Lights Out

While Boozer and Ngongba dominated the paint in the second half, we have to give flowers to Isaiah Evans for keeping Duke afloat when things looked grim.

The sophomore sniper was electric, finishing with 17 points and 1 turnover. The absolute highlight of his night came in the first half when he baited a TCU defender into the air, drained a contested three-pointer, and absorbed the foul for a spectacular four-point play. When the offense was stuck in the mud, Evans was the tow truck that pulled them out.

Duke Marches On

By the time the final buzzer mercifully sounded for the Horned Frogs, the Blue Devils had shot an absurd 61.5% in the second half. They turned a two-point deficit into a 23-point blowout, showing a level of sheer dominance that should terrify whoever they face next.

The ghosts of the Siena scare are officially banished. Duke is heading to Washington, D.C., for the Sweet 16, where they will square off against the winner of St. John’s and Kansas. If the team that played the second half on Saturday shows up in the nation’s capital, the rest of the bracket is in serious trouble.