Coach K: Joey Baker Suffered From "Starter's Disease"

Sophomore struggled in first career start.

Coach Mike Krzyzewski singled out three players for their contributions in Duke’s 75-50 win over Brown. Wendell Moore Jr. finished with 10 points and a team-high seven rebounds while aggressively driving to the basket against the Brown defense.

Alex O’Connell hit the only three-pointers of the game for Duke.

“Wendell: four steals, rebounds, finishes,” Krzyzewski said. “Totally different than the first half. Alex: 0-for-5 in the first half, and he hit that one. Then we called a couple things for him, and he hit and hit. Two of the better passes in the game were when he drove baseline and had bullet passes across.”

Joey Baker got his first career start but struggled, hitting just 1-of-6 from the field.

“I think Joey got the starter’s disease,” Coach K said. “I told my staff – I’ve been doing this a long time—You get your first start, and I could see it yesterday in practice. Shooting, he couldn’t hit anything. I brought him over on the side after and told him, ‘Sometimes a really good shooter has to have a practice where there are bad shots.’ I said, ‘It’s good to just get them all out of you. So you did a great job of just getting them all out of you.’ It showed at the end of the first half, when he took two wild shots. I told him right after the game, ‘Starters disease. Just remember you’re a damn good player. You don’t have to change when you start.’ But it meant so much to him. We’re going through all those growth things.Thank goodness we were able to play well the last 15 minutes.”