Duke Bound for Elite Eight After Topping St. John’s, 80-75

Friday, March 27

Washington, D.C.

7:10 p.m.

Duke University

35-2,17-1ACC

St. John's

30-7,18-2Big East

St. John's (NY)

Duke

Caleb Foster and Patrick Ngongba celebrate against St. John's

Duke Bound for Elite Eight After Topping St. John’s, 80-75

3/27/2026 9:26:00 PM | Men's Basketball

Box Score Box Score (PDF)Postgame Notes (PDF)Duke Quotes (PDF)Opponent Quotes (PDF)

WASHINGTON, D.C. – For the third straight season, the Duke men's basketball team is in the Elite Eight as it held off St. John's, 80-75, in the Sweet 16 on Friday evening inside Capital One Arena. The Blue Devils, who were down by one at the half and trailed by as many as 10 points after intermission, clawed back and took the lead for good with 3:54 to play. Duke outscored the Red Storm 22-15 over the final 10 minutes en route to the comeback.

Isaiah Evans poured in a team-high 25 points, while Cameron Boozer finished with 22 and 10 rebounds for his third consecutive double-double and 22nd of the season. Caleb Foster, who returned to the lineup for the first time in the postseason, added 11 points on five-of-eight shooting in 18 minutes of action.

Duke (35-2) extended its current winning streak to a nation-best 14, while pushing its victory total in the last two seasons to 70, the most in a two-year span in program history.

HOW IT HAPPENED

After a defensive stop to open the game, Isaiah Evans got Duke on the board with a layup on the first offensive possession of the Blue Devils' evening. An offensive rebound and putback by Maliq Brown gave Duke a four-point edge, 8-4, after four minutes of play.
Cayden Boozer connected on Duke's first triple of the contest on the next trip down the floor. Duke remained in front, 11-9, at the first media break of the game. Caleb Foster checked in for the first time out of the timeout and promptly lobbed an alley-oop to Patrick Ngongba II.
St. John's (30-7) took its first lead, 14-13, with a three-pointer at the 13:39 mark. The Red Storm continued to increase its lead, growing it to as large as five, 20-15, at the halfway mark of the first half.
An acrobatic putback by Brown, followed by a fast-break dunk from Evans, pulled Duke back within one possession, 23-21. The Blue Devils' defense forced a shot-clock violation and knotted the score with a poster dunk courtesy of Dame Sarr.
Boozer put his team back in the lead, with a layup in transition as the clock ticked towards six minutes before halftime. Evans drilled his first trifecta of the night, increasing the margin to four and Cameron Boozer converted a three-point play on Duke's next offensive possession.
An extended 12-2 scoring run increased Duke's lead to seven, 35-28, at the under-four timeout. The Red Storm scored 12 of the final 16 points in the half, taking a 40-39 lead into the locker room.
Boozer opened the second half with a contested layup and Cayden Boozer found Evans for a fast-break three-pointer to quickly put the Blue Devils back in front, 44-40.
The Red Storm reeled off eight quick points, leading to a Duke timeout after three minutes of action. St. John's scoring run reached 13 unanswered, heading into the under-16 break, putting the Red Storm up by nine, 53-44.
After the lead grew to double-digits, Foster scored four quick points, forcing a St. John's timeout with 13:29 on the clock.
The junior guard continued to attack the basket, with another layup followed by a free throw after drawing contact at the rim. A floater from Nikolas Khamenia made it a one-possession game, 60-58, as the second half reached the halfway mark.
The Red Storm's lead continued to swing between two and four points, before an Evans triple briefly put Duke in front by one, 63-62. Boozer broke a 65-65 tie at 6:05 with a layup through contact.
Evans sank a step-back three-pointer as the game approached the final timeout, pushing the lead back in Duke's favor for the final time, 70-69. Boozer finished a layup while being fouled and capped the three-point play out of the timeout at the 3:06 mark, giving the freshman 20 points and his 22nd double-double on the season.
A Foster jumper pushed Duke's lead to 75-69 with 2:14 to play. The Red Storm did not go quietly, as a Zuby Ediofor three made it 75-72 with less than two to play.
After trading layups, an Ediofor free throw brought the score to 77-75 with 14 ticks remaining.
Ediofor missed the second free throw, setting up an Evans free throw with 11 seconds left to make it 78-75 Duke.
A missed three by St. John's with four seconds left led to Cameron Boozer's final two made free throws of the night and the 80-75 final score.

NOTES

Duke earned its 129th win in the NCAA Tournament, the third-most by any team in the history of the event.
- The Blue Devils improved their overall NCAA Tournament record to 129-42 (.754), marking the highest winning percentage in tournament history by a team with a minimum of 20 games played.
The Blue Devils advanced to the Elite Eight for the 26th time since Elite Eight records began in 1951.
- Duke earned a berth in the Elite Eight for the 13th time since 1998, the most by any team in that span.
- The Blue Devils have advanced to the Elite Eight in three consecutive seasons under head coach Jon Scheyer.
- Tennessee joins the Blue Devils as the only programs to make three straight appearances in a regional final.
The Blue Devils improved to 26-9 when playing in the regional semifinal and 61-11 when playing as a No. 1-seed.
Across the last two seasons, Duke owns the best record in Division I college basketball, at 70-6 (.921).
- The 70 wins across the last two seasons sets a new program record for best two-year stretch in Duke history, surpassing the 69 victories posted from the 1997-98 (32) and 1998-99 (37) campaigns.
- Since Thanksgiving 2024, the Blue Devils have achieved a record of 66-4 (.943).
Duke increased its current winning streak to 14 games, its longest stretch without a loss this season and the longest active streak in the nation.
The Blue Devils tabbed their 13th top-25 victory of the season. The Blue Devils had already secured wins over No. 1 Michigan, No. 7 Michigan State, No. 10 Virginia, No. 11 Virginia, No. 15 Florida, No. 17 North Carolina, No. 20 Louisville (twice), No. 20 Clemson, No. 22 Arkansas, No. 24 SMU and No. 25 Kansas.
- The victory was Scheyer's 25th over a ranked opponent, more than any other Division I head coach in their first four seasons.
Duke leads the all-time series with St. John's, 18-7, including a 3-1 record in the NCAA Tournament.
- The Blue Devils had previously defeated the Red Storm in the second round (1990) and regional final (1991).
- When playing on a neutral floor, Duke is 5-2 against St. John's.
The Blue Devils are 4-3 when playing on March 27, including a 100-93 victory over Arizona in the 2025 Sweet 16.
Friday's game was Duke's 302nd played when ranked No. 1 in the country, ahead of UCLA's 257 for the best total all-time (since 1949).
- Duke is 260-42 when ranked No. 1 in the country.
- Since 1998, the Blue Devils have played 200 games as the top-ranked team, more than twice as many as the next best tally (84 by North Carolina), with a record of 170-30 in those contests.
Duke trailed by one, 40-39, at the end of the first half.
- With the victory, the Blue Devils moved to 7-0 this season when trailing at halftime.
The Blue Devils fell behind by 10 points with 15 minutes remaining in the contest, yet rallied for the triumph.
- Duke has trailed by double figures in six outings this season, but overcame those deficits to win all six games.
The Red Storm entered Friday's game averaging 81.1 points per game, but were held to 75, 6.1 points below their season average.
- Duke's defense has held all but two of its 37 opponents below their scoring average this season.
St. John's took its largest lead, 55-45, with 15 minutes remaining. Across the final 15 minutes of play, Duke's defense held the Red Storm to just 20 points, finishing the game with a 35-20 margin.
At the start of Friday's game, Duke ranked fifth nationally for rebounding margin (+11.1).
- The Blue Devils outrebounded the Red Storm by 13 (40-27), finishing with a positive margin on the glass in 33 games this season.
- Duke has finished with a double-digit edge on the glass in eight consecutive games and a total of 23 times this season.
Duke held an advantage in three specialty stats, leading in points in the paint (40-28), second-chance points (15-8) and bench points (18-17).
The Blue Devils committed 13 fouls. Duke has a record of 72-3 (.960) when committing 15 or fewer fouls under Scheyer.
Duke has now connected on at least one 3-pointer in 1,301 straight games, the longest streak nationally.
Caleb Foster returned to the court 20 days after undergoing surgery for a broken foot following Duke's regular-season finale on March 7.
- The junior played 19 minutes, scoring 11 points on 5-of-8 shooting, including a key stretch of seven straight points in the second half.
Isaiah Evans led all scorers with 25 points, shooting 10-of-15 overall from the field and 4-of-8 from deep, while also grabbing four rebounds.
- When Evans makes at least three 3-pointers, Duke is 19-0 this season and 30-0 in his career.
Cameron Boozer scored 13 of his 22 points in the second half and grabbed 10 rebounds, tallying the 22nd double-double of his season.
- Boozer's 22 double-doubles matches Marvin Bagley (2017-18) for the Duke freshman record.
- Boozer has 14 double-doubles with at least 20 points this season.
- Boozer became the first Duke player to post a double-double in each of his first three NCAA Tournament games since Gene Banks (four straight) and Mike Gminski (three straight) both did so in 1978.

QUOTES

"You just have to tip your cap to St. John's. Obviously, Coach Pitino, you guys don't need me to tell you guys about how good of a coach he is and the career he's had. You combine that with their team, how hot they've been, it's hard to look at many games where they got exposed. Besides their first few games of the year, they've been on a roll. They gave us everything tonight. They were incredibly ready. Man, ...still a little stunned with what happened, to be honest with you, because what this guy (Caleb Foster) did. To be honest, he had no business playing tonight. Ninety-nine percent of guys do not come back to play under the circumstances of what's happened to him. It was incredible the way he willed us. There's no analytics, there's no stats that can measure how big this dude's heart is for what he did. Then obviously, Isaiah and Cam -- Isaiah, the shot-making. He's not afraid of any moment. Cam coming through in a big way. Then just collectively finding a way to get stops. Some of the threes they were hitting, they haven't hit those all the time. You've got to weather the storm and figure it out. But the story is about these guys next to me, the job that they did. It's an honor to go to the Elite Eight." - Duke head coach Jon Scheyer

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