Duke Basketball Team Now Dominating Like It's 1999

The current Duke basketball winning streak might spark memories for two Blue Devil assistants.

Duke basketball associate head coach Chris Carrawell / Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images

At this point in the 1998-99 season, Duke basketball had won nine straight in a eventual 32-game winning streak that didn't end until the loss to UConn in the NCAA Tournament title bout. Those Blue Devils, who finished 37-2 overall, steamrolled ACC opponents en route to a 16-0 conference record in the regular season.

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Now, the 2024-25 Blue Devils (13-2, 5-0 ACC), fresh off Tuesday night's 76-47 win over Pitt as third-year Duke basketball head coach Jon Scheyer improved to 40-3 in the friendly confines of Cameron Indoor Stadium, have won nine straight overall. That marks the third-longest active streak in the country.

And for the first time since 1999, Duke has prevailed in each of its first five ACC games by 10 points or more.

The 1998-99 Blue Devils posted a 27.0 average winning margin through their first five ACC games. As for this year's group in Durham, including two assistant coaches who were on the 1998-99 squad in Chris Carrawell and Will Avery, No. 4-ranked Duke has recorded its first five ACC wins by an average of 23.2 points.

"We need to keep building," Scheyer said in his opening statement following the defensive-minded effort against Pitt, in which the Blue Devils enjoyed a 1999-esque 18-0 run across the final eight minutes and held the Panthers to 37.1 points below their season scoring average.

Duke basketball aims to match the longest winning streak of the Jon Scheyer era when the Blue Devils host Notre Dame at noon ET Saturday (ESPN).

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