The big question hanging over the ‘new’ UK-Duke basketball recruiting rivalry

The reinvigorated recruiting success of the Kentucky men’s basketball program this offseason has filled the Big Blue Nation with good cheer.

Yet, nationally, the story of the current men’s hoops moment is all about — sorry, UK fans — those dastardly Dookies.

The headline on “The Field of 68” college basketball newsletter this week was to the point: Scheyer is on fire.

When Pennsylvania big man Dereck Lively chose Duke over Kentucky on Monday, it meant that Blue Devils head coach-in-waiting Jon Scheyer now holds verbal commitments from three of the top eight prospects in the 24/7 Sports Composite Rankings for the class of 2022.

It seems that all those college hoops fans who hoped the announced retirement of iconic Blue Devils Coach Mike Krzyzewski after the 2021-22 season meant the Duke program would recede in prominence may be disappointed.

Largely because of its failures in college football, the concept of tapping a head coach-in-waiting has fallen into disfavor.

Yet Duke’s coaching succession plan in which Scheyer, the former Blue Devils forward and current assistant coach, was given a year’s head start while Krzyzewski conducts a hoops farewell tour this winter so far looks astute.

To date, Scheyer’s recruiting haul includes the 7-foot-1 Lively, the No. 2 ranked prospect in the 24/7 Composite; No. 5 Dariq Whitehead, a 6-6 swingman; and No. 8 Kyle Filipowski, a 6-11 center.

For good measure, Scheyer has also landed the No. 56 prospect, 6-5 shooting guard Jaden Schutt. Duke also holds a commitment from point guard Caleb Foster, the No. 12 prospect in the class of 2023.

Scheyer’s early recruiting success is laying to rest any thought that, once Krzyzewski retires, Kentucky might easily regain a stranglehold on the top end of the one-and-done market similar to what the Cats carved out early in the John Calipari coaching era.

Meanwhile, with Calipari seemingly having re-energized UK’s recruiting efforts by importing new assistants Orlando Antigua and Chin Coleman from Illinois, Kentucky presently holds commitments from the players ranked No. 1 (Shaedon Sharpe), No. 6 (Chris Livingston) and No. 17 (Skyy Clark) in the 24/7 Composite.

The recruiting geeks think Kentucky is in good shape with the No. 7 (Cason Wallace) and No. 19 (Adem Bona) prospects, too.

So far, “the new world order” at the very top of men’s college hoops recruiting looks a lot like the old one. Yet, over the longer term, whether the UK-Duke high-end-recruiting duopoly endures depends on several variables:

1. Now that NCAA athletes have the right to benefit financially off of their names, images and likenesses, will that expand the pool of top-level prospects available to college hoops by slowing the trickle of such players who have in recent years been casting their lots with various pre-NBA professional leagues?

2. With Scheyer showing in his first class that he can recruit to Duke standards, will the young coach, only 34, also prove up to the task of melding high-level teams from rosters dominated by freshmen?

3. Having just convinced heralded class of 2022 recruits Emoni Bates and Jalen Duren to reclassify to the class of 2021 and play for Memphis, can former NBA star Penny Hardaway make the Tigers a third perennial presence battling at the top of the recruiting rankings?

Fascinatingly, with Kentucky coming off a 9-16 implosion in 2020-21 and Duke going through a coaching transition that will replace the face of Blue Devils basketball, both programs seem to be doubling down on the one-and-done recruiting approach.

You can spin the wisdom of that philosophy either way.

Calipari and Kentucky won the 2012 NCAA title with a starting lineup that included three one-and-done freshmen — Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and Marquis Teague.

Krzyzewski and Duke won the 2015 NCAA title with a starting lineup that included three one-and-done freshmen — Tyus Jones, Jahlil Okafor and Justise Winslow.

In that sense, there has been a 100-percent success rate in winning national titles by programs that went all in on one-and-done.

However, once both UK and Duke were fully committed to recruiting from the same talent pool, there has seemingly been diminishing returns for both programs.

Over the last five NCAA Tournaments, Kentucky and Duke have each won nine games in March Madness.

Seven programs — Gonzaga 17, Villanova 16, North Carolina 14, Kansas 12, Michigan 12, Oregon 10 and Virginia 10 — have won more NCAA tourney games over the same time frame.

Meanwhile, of the combined 25 players who have started for the past five teams to win the NCAA championship, there have been only two true freshmen — Villanova’s Jalen Brunson in 2016 and Virginia’s Kihei Clark in 2019.

Otherwise, the starters for the teams that have cut down the nets in the past five NCAA tourneys have been one redshirt senior; five seniors; four redshirt juniors; 11 juniors; a redshirt sophomore; and a redshirt freshman.

So for all the sound and fury ginned up by Scheyer’s early recruiting wins and Kentucky’s own resurgence with top-10 prospects, it remains an open question whether the battle UK and the Dookies have rejoined represents the most-likely way for either program to claim future national titles.