No. 9 Duke holds off Wake Forest on short rest. 3 takeaways from the Blue Devils’ win

With Wake Forest’s big men Efton Reid and Andrew Carr in foul trouble, No. 9 Duke’s interior players found plenty of space to lead the Blue Devils to another ACC win.

Mark Mitchell scored 23 points and Kyle Filipowski added 21 as the Blue Devils toppled the Demon Deacons, 77-69, in ACC basketball at Cameron Indoor Stadium on Monday night.

Guard Jared McCain scored 17 points and Jeremy Roach 12 for Duke (19-5, 10-3 ACC), which won for the 14th time in the past 16 games.

The 7-foot Reid committed three first-half fouls and fouled out having produced eight points and four rebounds in his 15 minutes of play. The 6-11 Carr picked up his fourth foul with 12:56 to play before fouling out with 12 points.

In a game where Duke never trailed, the Blue Devils saw Wake draw as close as three points with 7:54 to play. But Duke rattled off six consecutive points on two McCain free throws and two Filipowski baskets to take a 61-52 lead with 6:09 left.

Wake never cut Duke’s lead to fewer than five points the rest of the game.

The Blue Devils shot 46.3% for the game, including 60.9% in the second half when they pulled away from a 29-29 halftime tie.

Wake Forest (16-8, 8-5 ACC) saw its three-game winning streak snapped as the Deacs shot 39.1% and hit just 6 of 26 3-pointers.

Hunter Sallis led Wake Forest with 22 points.

Here are three takeaways from the game:

Mitchell finds his groove

Mitchell has been Duke’s most consistent scorer over the past seven games. After missing two January games with a sprained knee, Mitchell has scored in double figures in six of the team’s past seven outings, averaging 15 points per game during that stretch.

His 23 points against Wake Forest matched his season-high output.

Sallis carries the Deacs

Having scored in double figures in every game this season, Sallis made sure that streak continued Monday by scoring 14 points in the first half.

The 6-7 junior, who played the past two seasons at Gonzaga before transferring, entered Monday night averaging 18.5 points per game. He continued to look every bit like a player under consideration for all-ACC honors.

It took until 4:12 remained in the game for a second Wake Forest player to reach double figures in scoring. That’s when Andrew Carr scored inside to record his 10th point.

Poor shooting early

Duke had opportunity after opportunity to open a big lead in the first half as Wake Forest struggled to make a basket.

The Deacs missed their first 11 3-pointers over the game’s first 10 minutes. They were just 4 of 21 from the field overall during that stretch.

But Duke turned the ball over five times during that same time frame and began missing shot after shot as well.

The Blue Devils led 16-10 before Damari Monsanto hit Wake’s first two 3-pointers on back-to-back possessions to tie the game at 16.

At that point Duke had missed 11 of its past 12 shots from the field.

The Blue Devils built a 26-19 lead with 3:42 left until halftime, but managed to score just one point over their next six possessions while missing three shots, committing a turnover and seeing Filipowski hit 1 of 3 free throws.

After Wake tied the score at 27, Filipowski’s jump shot at the buzzer left Duke up 29-27 at halftime despite having only shot 35.5%. Wake hit only 28.2% of its shots.