DURHAM — Following Duke basketball’s loss at UNC, head coach Jon Scheyer couldn’t wait to get the Blue Devils back on the court.

“For me, I was anxious to hit our team right away. Sunday’s an off day. For me, it was important to bring them in as early as we could on Monday,” Scheyer said.

“I didn’t want to wait until practice at 2. We brought them in early. I had a very honest, heartfelt meeting — I guess you could call it that — and they had a great response.”

The second-year coach didn’t go the Coach K route and take away Duke gear or kick the Blue Devils out of the locker room, but Scheyer wasn’t pleased with the effort he saw in Chapel Hill.

“I thought we got into a thing (at UNC) where we paced and didn’t play every play,” he said.  “. … To win these games, you have to play every play.”

Normally, Scheyer added, the Blue Devils would have a scout team during practice. But that wasn’t the case Monday as Duke put its top 10 players on the court for a Blue vs. White scrimmage.

“It was intensity, like, ‘This is not what we stand for, this is not what Duke is, and we’re gonna change that today — this week. We’re gonna come out and play hard for the rest of this season and we’re not gonna have anymore games like that,’ ” Freshman guard Caleb Foster said, referring to Scheyer's message during Monday’s meeting.

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What followed was some healthy competition and “lots of drills.”

“If you lose, you’re on the line,” Foster said. “It was a lot of running, just getting us right.”

Sophomore center Kyle Filipowski confirmed those details about Monday’s practice.

“It was just strictly a competition day for us,” Filipowski said. “We were just going at it with each other, trying to do some competition drills. That’s what the coaches want: to see the effort out of us and translate that to the games.”

On Wednesday, the increased effort showed on the scoreboard: No. 9 Duke 71, Notre Dame 53.

“The good part as a coach, I’ve told you guys this before: They always respond. This group always responds, and Monday was no exception,” Scheyer said.

“I thought the competitive edge that we had brought out some things in us. … Monday was one of those old-school Duke days that we needed.”

Despite shooting 43.3% and scoring its third-fewest points of the season, Duke (17-5, 8-3 ACC) grabbed a season-high 16 offensive rebounds and limited Notre Dame (7-16, 2-10) to 33.9% shooting from the floor.

“For me, I just thought it was a great team effort. … I thought it was great to get a win without necessarily playing our best on offense,” Scheyer said.

He went on to say it was “far from perfect,” but “it was the right step” for the Blue Devils. They’ll aim for another positive response Saturday against Boston College (13-9, 4-7).

“Is it where I want it to be? No, absolutely not,” Scheyer said. “But it was a good response and the right step. We gotta get better with that. Every day we have to get better.”

Staff writer Rodd Baxley can be reached at rbaxley@fayobserver.com or @RoddBaxley on X/Twitter.

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: How Jon Scheyer dealt with Duke basketball after UNC loss