Can Cameron Boozer be stopped? Why each person has didn’t this level

Had Michigan vital person Yaxel Lendeborg valid considered a ghost?

His Wolverines — then the No. 1 crew within the country — had been weak to overwhelming opponents on the glass and within the paint. As a substitute, they had valid been outrebounded and outscored by Cameron Boozer and the No. 3 Duke Blue Devils, and Lendeborg may maybe perchance well not derive the phrases to checklist the vital person freshman.

“Um … man … um,” Lendeborg hedged when asked about Boozer’s play after the Feb. 21 game, shaking his head and trailing off.

Boozer has had that mystifying enact on every opponent he has faced when the stakes are high.

Take dangle of performances within the middle of the 2025-26 marketing and marketing campaign personal made him the optimistic current for national participant of the one year honors in a season that aspects arguably basically the most proficient freshman class of the one-and-done generation, no longer to speak a pair of returning All-Individuals. The hole between the 18-one year-stale and the country’s varied elite players become widened within the get over Michigan, attributable to his game-altering 3-pointer and the procedure of a key goaltending name within the closing minutes.

Lendeborg become no longer the essential vital person Boozer humbled this season. He had 24 aspects and 23 rebounds in opposition to Tennessee’s Nate Ament in a preseason get. Projected NBA draft lottery picks Darius Acuff Jr. and Thomas Haugh may maybe perchance well very finest interrogate in dismay as Boozer scored 64 aspects mixed in wins over Arkansas and Florida, respectively. Boozer furthermore bulldozed Jeremy Fears Jr. and Michigan Relate to the tune of 18 aspects and 15 rebounds. Within the meantime, the ACC remains to be making an attempt to score its breath from Boozer’s spectacular efforts within the middle of convention play, with rival North Carolina up next in Saturday’s customary-season finale (6:30 p.m. on ESPN) — a game that will maybe perchance well seal Duke’s uncover for the No. 1 total seed within the NCAA match.

“We’ve been in a lot of big-time games, a lot of close games, against a lot of highly ranked teams or talked-about teams,” Boozer said about himself and his brother Cayden, furthermore a 5-vital person freshman for the Blue Devils. “So I feel like just being in a lot of those moments prepares you for this.”

Other folk which personal watched the upward thrust of Boozer — son of Carlos Boozer, a outdated NBA All-Huge title who obtained a title with Duke in 2001 — would agree. There is a trendy thread that ties his basketball profession collectively, from middle college to speak day: He’s a defensive jam no longer very finest attributable to his size, relentless motor, intellect and a talent method that has made a him a projected top-three decide within the 2026 NBA draft, nevertheless furthermore attributable to the formula the sport looks to decelerate for him within the very most practical-force moments.

Boozer obtained four deliver titles with Columbus High School at Florida’s very most practical level of prep basketball. He led the Explorers to a national title in 2025. His AAU crew, the Nightrydas, obtained three consecutive Nike EYBL crowns. He become co-MVP of final one year’s McDonald’s All American game. He obtained Gatorade Player of the one year twice, plus two gold medals with USA Basketball. That level of dominance technique the same quiz opponents personal repeatedly asked about Boozer will procedure shut middle stage in March: How originate you terminate him?

Kansas’ Darryn Peterson may maybe perchance well need the very most practical NBA ceiling on this freshman class. And BYU’s AJ Dybantsa is its most involving and explosive talent. But Boozer is, smartly, the winningest.

Every time championships had been on the toll road in his profession, Boozer has obtained. And within the take dangle of moments of vital video games, he has delivered.

“It’s his greatest tool. It’s his greatest asset,” Miami head coach Jai Lucas, a outdated Duke assistant who recruited Boozer, said. “It’s like he’s been there before, and he’s been that way since he was in seventh, eighth grade. He’s always played with an older vibe, a veteran vibe about him.

“No moment, no difficulty is simply too wide for him.”

Andrew Moran’s phone buzzed the night before a regional matchup in the 2022 Florida state playoffs.

As the Columbus High School coach was preparing his squad to face its next opponent, Boozer — a team captain as just a 14-year-old freshman — had watched the film and written a scouting report. He noted the hand signals the opposing coach had used for each set.

“It had descriptions of their plays and it had the time stamps wherein it came about throughout the sport. And in the starting up I become puzzled,” said Moran, who is now an assistant at Miami. “I looked at it and I become cherish, ‘What the hell is he sending me?’ After which I realized, ‘Oh man, this man is sending me detailed stuff.’ So for me, I become cherish, ‘Right here is any other level of preparation at this age.'”

Boozer fell in love with the game early.

There is video of a seventh-grade Boozer blocking shots into the parents section of former NBA All-Star Chris Paul’s middle school combine in 2019, dribbling behind his back and throwing full-court passes. He already had a bag of skills players his age clearly couldn’t match.

“That’s a throwback. I wager I had yellow hair support then,” Boozer said, referencing the gold hairstyle he sported at the time.

When the pandemic closed schools and gyms around the country, Boozer and his buddies played pickup games every day, sometimes in the rain, often on the full court at his house. That’s when his friends noticed a shift.

Dante Allen was Boozer’s AAU teammate then. He asked his father, Malik Allen, an assistant coach for the Miami Heat, to put their pickup crew through drills before playing 5-on-5. It was already evident Boozer had the tools to be a great player, but the drills showcased how his intensity was growing.

“I wager that is undoubtedly when he began to derive plenty better as a basketball participant,” Dante Allen said. “I may maybe perchance deliver every drill, he become very intentional with it. There become no level where he become going something else decrease than a 100% paddle with it, valid making an attempt to be basically the most efficient that he can. After which when we started enjoying pickup, it become valid carrying over every thing that we may maybe perchance been doing, your complete lessons he’d learned.”

During his freshman year at Columbus High School, Boozer’s combination of brains and brawn thrust his team into the state championship game against Dr. Phillips High School’s roster of now-Division I players Denzel Aberdeen (Kentucky), Ernest Udeh Jr. (Miami) and Riley Kugel (UCF). Boozer scored a team-high 17 points to help Columbus High capture its first state title.

“It become the finest matchup that we had at that level, and he become valid truly poised and got us to the get,” Cayden Boozer said.

The victories piled up from there as Cameron’s game developed.

Coach Stamp Griseck figured his Windermere High School crew would personal its fingers plump in opposition to Boozer and a Columbus crew in quest of its fourth consecutive deliver title final one year. Early within the sport, he said, Boozer method the tone.

“The principle time my level guard got hit with a ball cover cover from Boozer, he goes, ‘Man, it took me about three or four trips support down the court docket to derive my senses support,'” said Griseck, whose team lost 68-36. “Because Boozer method a cover cover on him and it nearly knocked him out. And it wasn’t illegal. It become valid a cover cover by a tree.”

The opposing players in that lopsided affair noticed not only Boozer’s skills and dominance, but also the way he orchestrated the action on the court.

“He become anchoring his offense and no longer very finest anchoring it nevertheless calling out the plays,” said TJ Drain, a Windermere alum who now plays at Liberty. “He become very vocal along with his teammates in encouragement, and that indubitably stood out to me. Whether it become a correct inch or a sizable cut or he’d deliver, ‘I do know you are going to invent the following one.'”

Boozer’s family background gave him a head start in basketball. His determination did the rest. To those who have witnessed his development, his success at Duke isn’t surprising. They saw the seeds of what he blossomed into a long time ago.

“He’s getting wherever he desires to,” Allen said. “It’s no longer vital if it is a 7-foot, 300-pound participant in front of him or if it is a pesky guard in front of him, Cam goes to derive wherever he desires, regardless. And I wager the truly no longer easy portion about that is that he can derive wherever he desires to after which the truth that he goes to make the ideal play.”

Exactly 32 hours before Notre Dame was set to tip off against Duke, Fighting Irish head coach Micah Shrewsberry was concerned about how his team would handle Boozer.

Those worries were justified. Notre Dame scored only 22 points in the first half. Boozer had 20 on his own. The Blue Devils went on to win 100-56.

“I am slightly particular he and his brother had been doubtlessly dominating after they had been 8-one year-olds, your complete formula by,” said Shrewsberry, who left the game in a walking boot after suffering an Achilles injury while he coached his team. “He plays as no longer easy as any one accessible. There’s no longer the kind of thing as a conceitedness to him. It looks to be cherish winning’s truly vital to him, and he goes to originate no topic it takes to get.”

Howard head coach Kenny Blakeney knows what it takes to win, too. He was on the Duke team that won its second straight national title in 1992. Having played with Christian Laettner, Grant Hill and Bobby Hurley, Blakeney also knows talent. And he realized Boozer is a lot more than that when his Bison played the Blue Devils in November, saying the “ginormous” Boozer plays like a “toddler Jokic” — comparing him to three-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic.

“Within the event you interrogate the Duke game in opposition to us, Duke become closing out the sport, working ball shows for a 6-foot-9, 250-pound dude to derive downhill and make choices,” Blakeney said. “He shoots it smartly. He’s a fantastic passer. He can originate no topic he desires to originate on the low block.

“It’s like the criticism from what I hear is that he’s not bouncy enough. Well, you can’t stop the stuff that he can do, so he doesn’t need to be.”

It become very finest this time final one year that Cooper Flagg become authoring one of many finest freshman campaigns within the one-and-done generation. And Boozer is arguably outplaying him.

Boozer is averaging extra aspects (22.6 vs. 19.2) and rebounds (10.0 vs. 7.5) than Flagg, and virtually as many assists (4.0 vs. 4.2). Boozer is furthermore a better 3-level shooter and is enjoying extra minutes. His present 135.3 offensive ranking would method a document within the KenPom generation (since 2003-04) if it holds. And he has led Duke to its easiest open (28-2) since 1998-Ninety 9, when that squad started 29-1 (and obtained 32 video games in a row).

Boozer has a possibility to discontinue his profession as one of many finest rookies of all time — no longer valid at Duke. Based entirely on knowledge scientist Evan Miya, Boozer is having basically the most efficient season in college basketball since as a minimum 2009-10, surpassing Zach Edey’s 2d consecutive Wood Award season in 2023-24 (25.2 PPG, 12.2 RPG, 2.0 BPG).

“I just think he’s wired for it. He lives it,” Duke head coach Jon Scheyer said. “He’s incredibly prepared going into the games of understanding the different coverages he can see. I mean, we’ve seen so many different defenses, whether it’s doubles or single coverage or heavy plugs, whatever it is. I credit his preparation. I credit the fact that he just lives it every single day.”

At the following level, Boozer will compete in opposition to players who may maybe perchance well need traits he lacks. He’s no longer an above-the-rim threat or strolling “SportsCenter” highlight cherish Dybantsa and Peterson, who’re projected to head sooner than him within the NBA draft. But Boozer is a total participant with a knack for navigating adversity to get video games.

“One of his biggest intangibles is a winning pedigree. Championships, MVPs, gold medals, he’s won at every stop, at a high level, and is a primary contributor on a team that is in position to win it all in April,” one NBA govt instructed ESPN. “He seems to be about all the right things.

“His actions speak that he cares about winning, enjoying the sport the ideal formula, dealing along with his industry with maturity and professionalism.”

On Saturday, Boozer will lead Duke into its regular-season finale against North Carolina, the ACC outright title already in hand. After that, the Blue Devils will ask him to do what he has done throughout his career: lead them to a championship — their first since 2015.

Accepting that responsibility is all Boozer knows. He always has done his best work when the stakes are highest.

“There’s plenty that comes with being at Duke, nevertheless you’d no longer attain to Duke ought to you had been haunted of that or didn’t desire to be a portion of that,” Boozer said. “Or no longer it is the finest designate in college basketball. There may be repeatedly a highlight, repeatedly a procedure for your support, so you attain to Duke to play in these moments — to be in these moments.”