Mark Mitchell scored a career-high 21 points and Jared McCain heated up from the perimeter to score 18 points to lift No. 14 Duke past Syracuse 86-66 on Tuesday night in Durham, N.C.
The Blue Devils (10-3, 1-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) won their fifth game in a row since an ACC-opening defeat at Georgia Tech.
Duke, which shot 75 percent from the field in the second half, made all eight of its 3-point attempts in second half after failing to connect on all nine long-range tries in the first half.
Jeremy Roach racked up 17 points, Tyrese Proctor notched 14 points and Kyle Filipowski, who was scoreless in the first half, finished with 12 points and a team-high seven rebounds.
Maliq Brown was a force in the lane for Syracuse, producing 26 points and seven rebounds, and Judah Mintz had 18 points. But the Orange (10-4, 1-2) had a five-game winning streak snapped while losing for ninth straight time to Duke.
McCain’s third 3-pointer of the second half gave Duke a 62-49 lead. He hit a trey on the Blue Devils’ first possession of the half, and the hot shooting extended to others on his team.
Syracuse was within 44-41 with slightly more than 16 minutes to play. The Orange ended up 4-for-16 from beyond the arc and were charged with 17 turnovers.
Mitchell had 18 first-half as Duke went to the break with a 35-33 lead despite its long-distance shooting woes.
Syracuse stayed within range despite shooting 34.5 percent from the field in and committing nine turnovers the opening 20 minutes. Duke withstood foul trouble that limited starting forward Filipowski to 7 1/2 minutes and backup Ryan Young, who had three fouls by the break, to 4 1/2 minutes.
The teams, meeting for the only time this regular season, began a combined 8-for-27 from the field with seven turnovers in eight minutes.
–Field Level Media
