Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Player of the Week: Grayson Allen, Duke

Duke v Michigan State

CHICAGO, IL - NOVEMBER 14: Grayson Allen #3 of the Duke Blue Devils puts up a shot on his way to a game-high 37 points against the Michigan State Spartans during the State Farm Champions Classic at the United Center on November 14, 2017 in Chicago, Illinois. Duke defeated Michigan State 88-81. (Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)

Getty Images

I’m not sure that we’ll see a better performance this season than what we saw out of Grayson Allen on Tuesday night in Chicago.

Playing against the No. 2 team in the country in Michigan State, Allen scored 23 of his 37 points in the second half, hitting big three after big three after big three as the Blue Devils were able to knock off the Spartans despite the fact that star freshman Marvin Bagley III went out with an eye injury midway through the first half.

And frankly, it should be all that surprising that Allen can do what he did on Tuesday.

We’re talking about a guy that was a second-team all-american as a sophomore and the consensus preseason National Player of the Year prior to his junior season. He’s healthy now, physically and, seemingly, mentally, and he’s the veteran presence on a Duke team that has as much youth as they’ve ever had under Coach K. He’s Quinn Cook from Duke’s 2015 team. He’s Darius Miller from Kentucky’s 2012 team.

But he is also going to be asked to be more involved offensively. Nights like Tuesday will be what he is going to have to do throughout the year. When the younger guys on that roster are struggling, he’s going to be the one that is asked to take over, and on Tuesday he proved that he’s more than capable of doing so.

The irony in all of this is that Allen showed up in the biggest night of hoops to date, the only night where we’ve been able to escape talk of FBI investigations, players getting arrested in China, LaVar Ball going tweet-for-tweet against Donald Trump and impermissible benefit violations, it was Grayson Allen that we were all talking about.

Mr. Controversy himself gave us actual basketball to talk about.

Who saw that coming?

THE ALL-‘THEY WERE GOOD, TOO’ TEAM


  • TREVON BLUIETT, Xavier: Bluiett has been one of the best players in college basketball through the season’s first two weeks, and he put the exclamation point on his start with a terrific performance - well, terrific finish - in No. 15 Xavier’s win at Wisconsin. Bluiett hit two threes within the span of a minute to break a 66-all tie and give Xavier a lead they’d never relinquish. Bluiett has scored at least 25 points in all three games this season.
  • JORDAN MCLAUGHLIN, USC: McLaughlin scored a career-high 35 points on Sunday night, leading USC back from a nine-point second half deficit to land an overtime win at Vanderbilt. He made too many big shots down the stretch to count.
  • JORDAN MURPHY, Minnesota: Murphy was the best player on the floor in what was arguably the Big Ten’s best win to date, as the Golden Gophers went into Providence and knocked off a good Friar team. Murphy had 23 points, 14 boards and three blocks in that win and, on the season, is now averaging 24.8 points and 12.8 boards. He’s had at least 18 points and 11 boards in all four Gopher wins. Who knew that Minnesota’s strength was going to be their front court?
  • KEENAN EVANS, Texas Tech: The Red Raiders made a statement this weekend, as they easily won the Hall Of Fame Tip-Off, cruising past Boston College before bullying then-No. 21 Northwestern. Evans was the star of the show. He had 54 points in the two wins.
  • DONOVAN JACKSON, Iowa State: The Cyclones had an awful start to the regular season, but bounced back this week by winning the Puerto Rico Tip-Off. Jackson was the star, as he averaged 25.3 points in the three wins and scored at least 24 points in every game.