Duke 64, Arizona State 53

NEW YORK -- Last weekend, Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski made a point of calling Arizona State's Herb Sendek "one of the best coaches in the country."

But Wednesday night, yet again, the Blue Devils had the better team.

Krzyzewski, 21-3 against Sendek when Sendek coached at N.C. State, put one more victory in the head-to-head win column by beating the Sun Devils 64-53 in the semifinals of the NIT Season Tip-Off at Madison Square Garden.

As a result, seventh-ranked Duke (5-0) will play No. 13 Connecticut, which blew out LSU in the early game, in Friday's 5 p.m. championship game.

The Sun Devils' (4-1) style was reminiscent of the Wolfpack's during Sendek's 10 years in Raleigh: grinding and defense-focused.

As a result, score was knotted 41-41 with 13:48 left when the Blue Devils hunkered down and started getting the ball to Kyle Singler, the preseason ACC Player of the Year who had only four points on 1-for-6 shooting by halftime. After making a jumper and a hook shot, his 3-pointer gave the Blue Devils a 50-43 cushion, the beginnings of a 19-6 run that was enough to pull away, for good.

Singler finished with 13 points, teammate Jon Scheyer added 16 and Nolan Smith chipped in 14.

Eric Boateng, who played his freshman year at Duke before transferring to Arizona State after the 2005-06 season, had four points and four walks on the first half, had four points and eight turnovers.

Although ASU lost All-American James Harden and first-team All-Pac-10 forward Jeff Pendergraph from last year's NCAA squad, it also returned three starters - and it looked like it from the outset.

Duke trailed by as much as 15-7 early, as the Sun Devils specialized in turning loose balls into buckets. The Blue Devils chipped back with an 11-3 run, tying it 18-18 when freshman guard Andre Dawkins buried a 3-pointer.

Meanwhile, Scheyer, the starting point guard who had 21 assists and zero turnovers through Duke's first four games, turned it over for the first time this season during that run when he stepped on the sideline in front of ASU's bench with 11:58 left.

He made up for it, though.

Duke took the lead with about 5:40 left, when Scheyer (nine first-half points) buried a long jumper from the corner to make it 24-23. ASU kept responding, as Rihards Kuksiks's 3-pointer knotted it at 28-28 with 2:59 left.

But the Blue Devils took a 34-30 lead into halftime when Brian Zoubek buried a free throw, and Scheyer buried a 3-pointer.

Not that it lasted. With 13:43 left, the score was knotted, again, 41-41, when  Derek Glasser followed his own 3-pointer with a shot in the lane.