DURHAM, N.C. — Of all the tens, if not hundreds, if not thousands of play calls Jon Scheyer will make over the course of this season, may the closing seconds of Tuesday night’s classic serve as future guidance:
Put the ball in your best player’s hands and let him go win you the game.
Scheyer, of course, is as well-acquainted with that strategy as any college basketball coach you’ll find, especially after last season. Duke fans won’t soon forget that in each of the Blue Devils’ four defeats a year ago — including, most painfully, to Houston in the Final Four — Scheyer put the ball in Cooper Flagg’s hands late and asked the eventual No. 1 pick to go make magic.
But Scheyer, still 38 and only in his fourth season as Duke’s head coach, is nothing if not a learner. Someone who wakes up before sunrise to call coaching friends in Europe, or browse late-night NBA plays from the night before — anything to possibly give his team even the slightest edge. Agonizing as it must have been, Scheyer surely rewatched all four of those losses this summer, reliving his decision making and thinking ahead to what he’d do differently the next time.
Like when there’s only 30.9 seconds left to play in a marquee non-conference clash, and Florida leads his team by two.
To that point Tuesday night, Cam Boozer — Duke’s latest freshman superstar, and the prohibitive too-early favorite to win the Wooden Award — practically had his way with Florida’s front court, the entirety of which returned from the Gators’ national championship squad last season. Yet Boozer still finished with 29 points, the fifth time in nine games he’s had at least 25. With the game on the line, it was only natural that Scheyer would play the same card he always had, giving Boozer the ball and bandwidth to maintain Duke’s undefeated start.
Instead? When Florida’s defenders hedged against Boozer and left Isaiah Evans wide open atop the key, Boozer swung the ball to the career 38.9 percent 3-point shooter and trusted the thought process.
Swish.
And, basically, ballgame: No. 4 Duke 67, No. 15 Florida 66.
The game winner from Isaiah Evans!!! pic.twitter.com/RnDrSrXgHp
— Blue Devils (@BlueDevils) December 3, 2025
So, was that how Scheyer drew up the final play in the huddle?
“Yes, actually,” Scheyer joked postgame. “That exactly.”
Even though Evans, to that point Tuesday, had been 0-for-7 from 3? Freezing cold, especially by a sharpshooter’s standards?
“I gotta get to church,” Evans said of his game-winner. “I gotta give praise to God on that one.”
Not every last-second play call is going to go so swimmingly — nor will the subsequent defensive possession to seal things. After all, on Duke’s penultimate defensive possession, right before Evans’ 3, the Blue Devils miscommunicated their coverage and left Florida guard Boogie Fland wide open for a 3 of his own, giving the Gators a two-point lead.
But after Evans’ shot, which sent shockwaves through Cameron Indoor, the Blue Devils sat down in their stances and guarded up to the standard Scheyer has established in his four seasons running the program. Fland wound up with the ball on the right wing, with Boozer defending him — only for Duke to also hedge the late ball-screen, sending junior guard Caleb Foster to double. That forced Bland to adjust, step back… and ultimately dribble off his own foot, with the loose ball flying straight at Foster.
All the junior guard had to do at that point was fall down, get fouled and effectively clinch Duke’s first 9-0 start since 2018.
“I saw he was fumbling with it,” Foster said of his game-sealing steal. “It’s win or lose right there. I saw the game on the line.”
That sequence is what will (rightfully) endure on Duke highlight reels the rest of this season. And for a team starting two freshmen and averaging under a year of Division I experience, it’s the sort of late-game situation that will pay dividends in the Blue Devils’ pursuit of a second straight Final Four berth.
More than those two individual plays, Tuesday was an encapsulation of why Scheyer’s fourth team may wind up his best yet — or at least the one that endures longer than any he’s had yet.
Duke coach Jon Scheyer showed he’s learned from past mistakes in the final minute of Tuesday’s win over Florida. (Jacob Kupferman / Getty Images)
Because of Boozer. Because of a young coach showing he can grow. And because of a complementary cast that’s seemingly improving every 40 minutes.
Start with Boozer, who has been nothing short of sensational this season and who once again carried Duke on Tuesday. Entering the game — before his 29-point, six-rebound, two-assist performance against one of the nation’s most formidable front courts — the 6-foot-9 freshman was already No. 1 on KenPom’s National Player of the Year by a healthy margin: The gap from Boozer to second on the list, Iowa State forward Joshua Jefferson, was almost three times the gap from Jefferson to tenth on the list, Vanderbilt guard Duke Miles. Moreover, Boozer has already scored 35 points in multiple games this season — the only Duke freshman to ever do so — and is one of just three Duke players in the last 45 years with a 35-point double-double.
The others are Zion Williamson and Christian Laettner. Decent company.
Boozer wasted no time stuffing the stat sheet again Tuesday, canning his first of three 3s less than four minutes into the game before settling into his typical bullying interior role. What makes Boozer such a mismatch, as Florida found out Tuesday, is that he can beat you in so many different ways.
Over the left shoulder with his right hand? Automatic. And if you shut that down, baby hooks with the left work just fine. Or on the perimeter, if you play drop coverage like Florida, then sure, he’ll bomb 3s over your head all night long. Good luck sending a double his way, because he’ll simply scan the floor and pass out of it — like he did in the game’s most pivotal moment Tuesday.
“My teammates trust in me,” Boozer said, “and I gotta take their trust and be aggressive with it.”
By giving Boozer the option on the decisive possession, his coach showed he clearly trusts Boozer too. Florida wing Thomas Haugh said postgame that Florida doubled Boozer that play because — like almost everyone watching — they figured he’d take the last shot.
And while Boozer deserves ample credit for that read, plus his perfectly-timed pass that prevented Florida’s help defense from moving, so does Scheyer for growing from last season’s late-game missteps. The proof: Tuesday wound up as Duke’s first win when trailing with less than a minute to play since toppling Clemson in January 2024.
Duke’s Cam Boozer got the better of Florida’s Thomas Haugh Tuesday night. (Lance King / Getty Images)
Already, nine games into this season, these Blue Devils have accomplished something critical that last season’s group never did.
Lastly, the complementary cast. Evans, the savior from 3… who also had a career-high five blocks, after only having three all of his freshman season. Foster, the embattled junior guard, who only scored six points but helped hound Florida’s guards into a dismal 10-for-35 shooting night. Patrick Ngongba, who had the best all-around game of his young career, finishing with 11 points, five rebounds, five blocks, and a game-high five assists — more than Florida had as a team.
“Our guys just battled,” Scheyer said. “Hopefully we can score better in some other games, but you’ve gotta win that way sometimes, and I thought our guys made big time winning plays.”
Enough of them, at the very least, to down the defending national champs, and to move to 3-0 in games against ranked opponents.
Enough to prove that, once again, the Blue Devils should be considered national title contenders.
And perhaps most importantly, enough to do something last season’s squad could not — something which could make all the difference come March.
“There’s a mental toughness to this group,” Scheyer said, “just to find ways to win.”