Duke basketball captain Jeremy Roach adds to preseason accolades

Duke basketball has a candidate to become its first Bob Cousy Award winner.

Duke basketball guard Jeremy Roach (Jim Dedmon-USA TODAY Sports)

Last week, Jeremy Roach became the only 2022-23 Duke basketball player to end up on the Preseason All-ACC First Team. Freshman Dereck Lively II, the Preseason ACC Rookie of the Year, is the only Blue Devil on the Preseason All-ACC Second Team.

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This week, Roach, who is this season's lone captain in Durham and the only returning starter from last season's 32-7 Blue Devils, landed on the 20-deep preseason national watchlist for the 2023 Bob Cousy Point Guard of the Year Award.

Duke's 6-foot-2, 180-pound junior floor general is one of three players from the ACC on the list, along with UNC junior Caleb Love and Virginia fifth-year Kihei Clark.

Roach was on the same preseason watchlist as a sophomore.

He then had a somewhat inconsistent campaign, averaging 8.6 points and 3.2 assists while shooting only 32.2 percent from downtown. However, the best version of Jeremy Roach thus far at Duke emerged in March while helping guide the Blue Devils to the Final Four.

Neither he nor any other ACC guard survived the cut when the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame's committee of top college basketball personnel trimmed the watchlist to 10 in late January. Villanova's Collin Gillespie, now on a two-way contract with the Denver Nuggets, ultimately took home the Bob Cousy trophy in April.

No Duke basketball talent has won the award since its inception in 2004.

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