Four-year Duke basketball starting guard Jeremy Roach delivered a game-winner for his new squad, the Baylor Bears, on Thursday. Two nights later, his three-year Blue Devil backcourt teammate, Jaylen Blakes, followed suit via a confident bucket in crunch time for the Stanford Cardinal, who improved to 6-0 this season with a 71-69 road win over the Santa Clara Broncos.
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Although the 21-year-old Blakes fell short of a double-digit scoring outing for the first time in his senior campaign, there’s no doubt he left his mark on the contest by producing the following pull-up dagger with two seconds left on the clock:
Blakes, a full-time Cardinal starter after drawing only three starts across his 84 games as a Blue Devil, finished with eight points against the Broncos, shooting 3-for-10 from the field, 0-for-1 from downtown, and 2-for-4 at the foul line. The New Jersey native added 10 assists, four more than his previous high as a collegian, plus two rebounds, four steals, and one block in his career-high 36 minutes on the floor.
He’s now averaging 14.3 points for Stanford, roughly eight times more than his 1.8 per game as a Duke basketball junior.
Of course, given his uptick in playing time and seemingly much-improved overall repertoire, it’s no surprise that Blakes’ averages of 3.2 boards, 5.3 dimes, and 2.3 steals are also career highs, not to mention his 46.9 field goal percentage.
Duke will welcome Jaylen Blakes back to Cameron Indoor Stadium when the Blue Devils host ACC newcomer Stanford on Feb. 15.
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