WRAL Sports Fan

Duke

Duke's Henderson finds his offensive game

By Jake Lloyd

Jan 7, 2009

Durham, N.C. — One word has summed up much of Gerald Henderson's two-and-a-half-year stay at Duke.

Potential.

This isn't to say the Blue Devils' junior hasn't done well or made his mark in Durham. Take, for instance, Henderson's game-saving performance in the first round of last season's NCAA Tournament, when he scored 17 of his 21 points in the second half to help Duke survive Belmont, 71-70.

Henderson won the game for the Devils by driving the ball from one end of the floor to the other for the go-ahead finger-roll layup. On that play, he not only showed his athleticism but also his will to not be stopped.

It was a great play, a leadership play, but not a common play by Henderson. All too often, despite great abilities to both drive the ball to the basket and shoot it over defenders, Henderson has played passive.

That was especially the case to start this season, as Henderson averaged 10.3 points during Duke's first nine games and attempted 10 shots just twice — and never took more than 10. Even last season, while playing on a similar team that also included senior and leading scorer DeMarcus Nelson, Henderson scored 12.7 points per game.

Duke has plenty of capable scorers and doesn't necessarily need Henderson to put up a lot of points to win, especially against lesser opponents. Even on the road against then-No. 9 Purdue, Henderson's season-low two points didn't keep the Devils from rolling to a relatively easy 76-60 win.

But with ACC season just getting underway, the tri-captain — along with Greg Paulus and Jon Scheyer — has found his offensive game, and Duke is better for it. Heading into Wednesday's non-conference game against Davidson, Henderson has averaged 16.8 points his last four games and taken 10 or more shots in each game.

"I think the biggest thing is my teammates finding me and also me being more aggressive on the offensive end and more hungry to score the ball," Henderson said. "Also getting some points off of my defense and getting out and running the floor."

In Duke's ACC-opening 69-44 win over Virginia Tech, Henderson's aggressiveness was clear. Twice in the first half, when the Hokies' leading scorer A.D. Vassalo made a basket on one end of the court, Henderson — constantly moving in Duke's motion offense — put his hands out and called for the ball.

Both times, Henderson received a pass and scored. The shots weren't forced and were still within Duke's offense, but the 6-foot-4 guard/forward didn't mask his intention to score. His 13 first-half points helped Duke to a 39-31 halftime lead before the defense smothered the Hokies in the second half.

Needless to say, Henderson's coaches and teammates are never surprised when he throws in an acrobatic layup, as was the case against the Hokies. And this year they haven't been surprised when Henderson catches passes in rhythm and makes 3-pointers — he is connecting on 37.1 percent of his outside shots.

They just want to see him do these things consistently.

After the first of Henderson's four good back-to-back scoring games against UNC-Asheville, starting point guard Nolan Smith said what the Devils know Henderson can do for them.

"'G,' offensively, is probably one of the most talented players in the country," Smith said. "So when he's assertive, I think his shots are going to start to fall.

"We have a team full of scorers, so G's going to score when he feels he needs to score. Nobody on our team's going to take a bad shot or force a shot. But there's going to be a time when G knows that he's going to have to try to take over a game."

That time hasn't come. But with the likes of No. 3 North Carolina and No. 4 Wake Forest looming on the schedule, just wait. Henderson, though, has already taken an early season experience and used it as motivation.

In Duke's lone loss, an 81-73 defeat Dec. 6 at Michigan, Henderson — when thinking back to the game — feels he had an opportunity to really assert himself when his team needed a boost. Instead, he took just eight shots and scored 11 points.

"I felt I could have played a lot better and helped us win," Henderson said. "Though we lost, I felt like we could have played a lot better.

"I think that kind of pushed me a little bit to contribute more."

What Henderson has done since then is nothing spectacular. He's taken more shots, made an average of one 3-pointer a game and shot almost four free throws per game.

That, in a nutshell, is what coach Mike Krzyzewski and his staff want to see out of Henderson: offensive balance.

"He can't just be a 3-point shooter. He can shoot the 3-point shot, but he should be a multi-dimensional scorer," Krzyzewski said. "Inside, with offensive rebounds, he needs to get to the line, and he needs to take threes.

"There should be no order in that, and it should just come about as the offensive exchange comes about."

In the three weeks since, Henderson has followed his coach's orders, scoring in an array of ways depending on where he is on the court. But the most surprising development has been his ability to make perimeter shots — especially considering that Henderson is not someone who shoots from way behind the line, and the arc was moved back a foot to 20 feet, 9 inches this season.

Henderson made 20 3-pointers all last season, connecting on 31.8 percent of his attempts. He has already knocked down 13 of 35 from behind the arc this season.

"In high school, I shot a lot of threes, but I didn't make a whole bunch," Henderson said. "My freshman year, it was still kind of the same but I shot them because I knew we were going to get a lot of open shots.

"Last year (was) kind of the same thing; I made a few more. But this year I definitely feel confident. We get a lot of open shots. There's not a lot of contested shots in our offense, so when I shoot them I feel like they're going to go in."

Which only makes Duke harder to guard, considering that fellow starters Smith, Scheyer and Kyle Singler all shoot well from distance. No one will argue that Duke lacks balance, with four players averaging double figures in points.

Still, with 15 more ACC regular-season games on the schedule followed by the ACC and NCAA tournaments, the Devils will more than likely find themselves in some tough spots. They'll need a player to step up and make a difficult shot or draw a foul.

And they know that Henderson, Duke's second-best NBA prospect behind Singler according to ESPN.com's Chad Ford, has the potential to do just that: take over a game. Heck, they saw it in the second half against Belmont.

"We need him, we need him badly," Krzyzewski said. "He and Jon and Kyle, really, are the three guys that have to be there every day for us at a really high level."