NEW YORK _ Pushed in a physical game, No. 1 Duke forged ahead with a second-half surge and held on to remain undefeated.
Cassius Stanley scored 20 of his 21 points in the second half while Tre Jones had 11 of his 13 after halftime as the Blue Devils topped Georgetown, 81-73, in the 2K Empire Classic tournament championship game at Madison Square Garden.
No. 1 Duke (6-0), which trailed by as many as 11 points in the first half, built a 14-point second half lead and held on for the win.
Freshman center Vernon Carey scored 20 points with 10 rebounds for the Blue Devils. Freshman Wendell Moore scored 17 points on 7-of-10 shooting.
Omer Yurtseven, the former N.C. State center who transferred to Georgetown in 2018, led the Hoyas (4-2) with 21 points despite playing only 23 minutes due to foul trouble.
The teams were tied at 33 at halftime when the Blue Devils, with Jones leading the way, put together a half-opening charge to take the lead for good.
Georgetown had possession but Jones stole the in-bounds pass and sank a break-away layup. After Yurtseven missed a jumper, Jones drove through the defense for a layup in a half-court set.
Yurtseven missed another jumper and, in transition, Jones tossed a long pass to Carey who dunked in two points.
In less than a minute of the second half, Duke had scored six points to lead 39-33.
That was the start of Duke's stellar second half of offense.
Three-pointers by Moore and Stanley gave Duke six made field goals on its first eight attempts and a 47-38 lead with 17:10 to play.
One minute later, Jones' in-bounds pass under the basket to Stanley resulted in a basket for a 51-40 Duke lead.
A 7-2 Duke run, aided by Georgetown coach Patrick Ewing's technical foul, pushed the Blue Devils' lead to 68-55 with 8:53 to play.
Stanley's 3-pointer with 4:59 to play gave Duke its largest lead at 77-63.
But the Blue Devils didn't score for the next four minutes and 30 seconds while the Hoyas reeled off 10 consecutive points. Yurtseven's basket with 1:21 left cut Duke's lead to 77-71.
Carey missed two free throws with 49.7 left and James Akinjo sank two free throws with 42.2 to play leaving Duke with a four-point lead.
But Jones and Stanley each sank two free throws over the final 25.9 seconds to close the win out for the Blue Devils.
In the first half, Georgetown built a 29-18 lead on strong shooting, making 11 of its first 18 shots (including 4 of 6 3-pointers). But the Hoyas only sank one field goal the rest of the half, going six minutes without one, to allow Duke to come back and take a 33-31 lead when a Carey dunk gave the Blue Devils a 7-0 run.
