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Sunday, December 18
Durham, N.C.
8 p.m.
Duke University
104
vs
77
Valparaiso
No. 1 Duke Races Past Valparaiso, 104-77
12/18/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
DURHAM, N.C. (AP) - J.J. Redick scored 30 points and Greg Paulus set a school freshman record with 15 assists as No. 1 Duke shook off a subpar defensive first half to beat Valparaiso 104-77 on Sunday night.
Shelden Williams added 19 points and 11 rebounds for the Blue Devils, who improved to 10-0 for the fifth time in six seasons, while Lee Melchionni scored 18 points.
Paulus broke the freshman record of 13 assists shared by Bobby Hurley, Jason Williams and Chris Duhon. He came within an assist of tying the school record owned by Hurley, who finished his career as the nation's career assists leader.
Dan Oppland scored 25 points to lead the Crusaders (4-3), who tried to hang around after falling behind by double digits early but never seriously threatened.
The Blue Devils were coming off a 97-66 victory over then-No. 2 Texas, a victory sparked by Redick's career-high 41 points and a dominating second half on both ends of the floor. Redick and the Blue Devils picked up where they left off offensively, hitting their first seven shots and playing the first 10 minutes at nearly an 80-point-per-half pace.
The problem was that the Blue Devils' defense wasn't its normal ball-stalking self, and that was enough to raise the ire of coach Mike Krzyzewski. Valparaiso shot 50 percent in the opening half and had a 25-15 rebounding edge to stay within nine points at halftime.
Still, Duke's offensive firepower - which included an impressive deluge in the opening 4 minutes - kept Valparaiso staring at 15- and 20-point deficits throughout the second half. Duke shot 58 percent with Redick - who hit nine 3s against the Longhorns - going 9-for-15 overall and 5-for-9 from behind the arc.
Duke got off to a fast start with Redick knocking down a 3 on the team's first possession, the first of seven straight shots to open the game. Redick nailed a second 3 in the run while Josh McRoberts made two layups off feeds from Paulus.
Paulus had five assists in that 7-for-7 stretch, which ended when he flipped a one-handed pass to Martynas Pocius for a transition layup and a 20-10 lead with 16:01 left.
Duke's defense, however, appeared to have Krzyzewski fuming by the end of the half.
On one play, Ali Berdiel drove right by McRoberts along the baseline and met no helpside defense on his way to the basket. After Berdiel's reverse layup dropped through to make it 39-27, Krzyzewski stood motionless and stared silently in McRoberts' direction.
A few minutes later, Shawn Huff got a wide open 3-point look in front of the Duke bench. The coach motioned for someone to pick up Huff and, though the shot missed, Krzyzewski immediately called a timeout and yelled at Pocius ``Get over here!'' for an animated sideline discussion.
Valparaiso got a jumper from Huff at the halftime horn to cut the deficit to 53-44, but that was as close as the Crusaders would get. Duke opened the second half with a 15-4 run, ending with a 3 from Redick and six straight points from Williams to make it 68-48 with 15:07 to play.
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