Chris Carrawell sees a familiar kind of Duke wing in Sebastian Wilkins.
That was the message from the Blue Devils’ associate head coach on Wednesday night, when he joined Blue Devil play-by-play voice David Shumate on the latest episode of Fast Break with Jon Scheyer. Carrawell didn’t hesitate to tie the 6-foot-8, 220-pound second-year forward to a player he knows well from Duke’s 2000-01 national title team.
“He’s going to be a key guy,” Carrawell explained about the 6-foot-8, 220-pound Wilkins. “He reminds me - I hate to go back, I always go back to the days I played - but like, the big wings that we had.
Sebastian kind of reminds me of Nate James, with the size, the athleticism. He can guard multiple positions.
“And like, kudos to him, because it wasn’t easy for him his freshman year. And he came back, he worked his tail off this summer, and he learned our system.
So now, he understands everything on the court, both ends, offensively and defensively. And he’s such a great teammate, always making the unselfish play.
And when you play that way, good things come, and he’s been playing great basketball for us.”
Carrawell’s comparison carries weight. He came to Durham in the same 1996 recruiting class as Nate James, and the two were teammates for four seasons, with James redshirting his sophomore year before becoming a major piece of the 2000-01 championship run. James averaged 12.3 points, 5.2 rebounds, and 1.6 steals for that 35-4 team and started 29 of the 39 games he played.
Carrawell has been around Duke long enough to know what a versatile, physical wing can mean in the program’s system. He’s been on the staff since 2018 and is now in his fifth season as associate head coach under Jon Scheyer.
Wilkins is starting to show that same kind of value. Last season, Carrawell helped the then-redshirt forward develop away from the spotlight. This year, Wilkins has moved into a clear bench role, and he’s answered every chance he’s gotten in preseason and in Monday night’s 84-50 season-opening win over Army.
Against the Black Knights, Wilkins logged 19 minutes and filled the box score: six points, two rebounds, one assist, and four steals. He shot 2-for-4 from the floor, missed his lone three-point attempt, and went 2-for-2 at the line. The Boston native also had four first-half steals, the most by a Duke player in a first half since Zion in the 2019 ACC Tournament.
Duke, ranked No. 2, now turns to Coastal Carolina, which visits Cameron Indoor Stadium at 8 p.m. ET Thursday on ACC Network.
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Diaz has already addressed the speculation and made clear he is happy at Duke, which is exactly the sort of reassurance the program wants to hear when another job opens up in the region. The timing also lands in a conference landscape where NC State has been through its own recent football changes and uneven results, a reminder that stability is a valuable commodity right now and one Duke would prefer not to lose. [Read more 🡒]