Jay Bilas discusses Duke's national championship chances

One of the biggest question this March is how Duke will fare in Mike Krzyzewski’s last NCAA Tournament. Ahead of the ACC Tournament championship, Jay Bilas addressed the Blue Devils’ chances of winning another national title.

Bilas said Saturday Duke has a strong chance of sending Coach K out on top. He pointed to the depth of the Blue Devils’ roster and how they have multiple weapons, meaning no one player carries the load on offense.

“They can win the whole thing,” Bilas said on SportsCenter. “I think they’re one of eight teams you would put as prohibitive favorites to win the title. But Duke has a lot of versatility. They’ve got shot-blocking and shot-changing with Mark Williams inside, who’s the ACC Defensive Player of the Year and in the running for national player of the year. He really changed at the end of the game when Kam McGusty drove in, he wound up walking because of his presence.

“But they also have four or five different guys that can get you 20 or 25 in a given game. That’s been proven over the last seven or eight games with the multiple weapons they have with not only Paolo Banchero but Wendell Moore Jr., Jeremy Roach has been coming off the bench and putting up great performances and Trevor Keels had, I think, 27 against Pittsburgh. AJ Griffin just put up 21 last night. They’ve got a number of different playmakers, and that makes them really difficult to guard.”

The road to the NCAA Tournament runs through Saturday’s ACC Tournament championship, though. Duke takes on Virginia Tech Saturday at 8:30 p.m. ET as it tries for its 16th tournament title under Krzyzewski.

Jay Bilas: Duke also has ‘defensive versatility’

But Duke doesn’t just have weapons on offense. Bilas said the Blue Devils play strong defense, and the numbers back it up. Duke ranks No. 38 in KenPom’s adjusted defensive efficiency and, of course, has Williams — who’s been a huge weapon on that end of the floor. Bilas added that could give Virginia Tech headaches on offense.

“On the defensive end, they’ve got defensive versatility,” Bilas said. “So it’s not like Virginia Tech’s going to be going against Carolina where they can exploit matchups and try to go at Armando Bacot or Brady Manek and then those guys are going to have longer closeouts. Duke’s a little bit more versatile defensively, although there’s one thing about Duke defensively.

“It seems there’s been this thing talked about that they’re old school Duke defense. They’re good defensively, but they’re not forcing a ton of turnovers and Virginia Tech is a low turnover team. That’s going to be an issue in the championship game tonight.”