Previously in the Duke-UNC Rivalry...
11 months later...
It was 340 days ago when UNC came in a shocked the Blue Devils on senior night. This time both teams are coming off losses and hoping to avoid what could be a major tailspin with another loss. UNC is looking at serious heat from a somewhat suprising UVa team and the resilent Boston College. Duke would drop to 5-5 with a loss and with road games at BC, Clemson, Maryland, and UNC the Devils could find themselves teetering close to a .500 record in the ACC.
So in short you have two wounded animals dealing with the major pressures of the season bearing down who also happen to hate each other. It should not disappoint.
8:57 PM: All right. Ready to go. Raycom/LF will have the local feed so I imagine I will have ESPN blacked out in Raleigh which means no Dick Vitale. My heart is broken as you might imagine</sarcasm>
8:58 PM: I cannot decide if I want to go with the radio audio or not, that may depend greatly on whether or not Billy Packer is doing the color analysis.
9:04 PM: The crowd has been cheering for about an hour or so now which makes no sense to me.
9:05 PM: Now it begins....
9:06 PM: Paulus is on Lawson and they just called Lawson for an offensive foul. Questionable to say the least.
9:07 PM: Terry crashes hard to deck, probably just banged the back a little hard.
9:08 PM: K left McRoberts and Nelson on the bench to start the game which is an interesting move. There is a rule about playing in Cameron and that is to whether the initial storm even if you go down early. UNC just needs to weather. Green has four off the bench in place of Terry and Duke is red hot early.
9:11 PM: Duke up 15-6 early but as Packer has pointed out the pace is fast which does not favor Duke. Roy has kept the same five on the floor through the first TV timeout with the exception of Green in for Terry who had the hard landing. UNC has to come off the timeout and settle down a bit.
9:15 PM: Frasor showing a lot of energy. I like the defensive intensity right now.
9:17 PM: Thompson needs to watch when he puts the ball on the floor.
9:19 PM: Okay, how does Hansbrough have three people on him and get cut over the eye and no foul gets called.
9:20 PM: Packer claims he has not seen Duke take it to UNC like this "in years" Are you serious? UNC has beaten Duke about four times this decade so far.
9:21 PM: Fight! Fight! Hansbrough runs in there I assume to grab Terry and make sure he doesn't do anything stupid. That if four jumpballs in the first nine minutes.
9:22 PM: I am concerned about the play right now but Duke is also shooting hot which in theory should cool down some as the game progresses. Duke does not have the horses to run with UNC the whole game so either they need to back off which may hurt their offense or they will run out of gas midway through the second half. UNC is not shooting badly but also not getting really good looks though I think Lawson can go by Paulus any time he wants.
9:24 PM: I understand why Zoubek does not play more minutes at Duke. He is really has awful footwork.
9:26 PM: Henderson pushes off, then goes up shoots, hits and they call Ellington for the foul. If the foul calling goes like that it will be a long night. Terry with a three which is huge. Duke 24-19.
9:28 PM: Terry is stepping up! Duke really cannot guard him one on one and aside from an out of control moment he has hit a three, hit Wright on the break, and then got the ball to Hansbrough off the drive to close the gap to 24-21.
9:30 PM: Duke is getting too many offensive rebounds at this point.
9:32 PM: Thompson was trying to dunk the ball, ends up grabbing the rim and they give him a technical foul. That is such a load of crap.
9:34 PM: Duke has cooled off but UNC cannot execute offensively. Duke 28-21 at the third TV timeout.
9:38 PM: Wow, Zoubek is horrible. He is slow and has no clue how to keep a pivot foot down.
9:39 PM: Scheyer is apparently the second coming of JJ Redick....on the FT line.
9:41 PM: We cannot hit anything. Numerous opportunities to close the gap and not capitalizing.
9:42 PM: Duke is up by eight at the last TV timeout of the half. It is not like UNC has not been in this position before, against Duke for that matter. The offensive execution is not there and I am not understanding the rotation at this point unless Roy simply wants to make sure UNC is well rested in the second half.
9:46 PM: This is how you lose a game. You come down with a chance to close the gap and keep the score within reason and you make no semblance of an effort to run your offense.
9:47 PM: If UNC loses it will not be on Terry, he showed up.
9:48 PM: How about cutting it to six or five here...and Thomas has no business taking that shot.
9:49 PM: Terry should play the whole second half. He is doing what needs to be done.
9:50 PM: Someone tell Ellington that you cannot drive around and possibly think help defense is not going to come from behind.
9:52 PM: Halftime with Duke up five.
I cannot imagine where this game would be had Reyshawn Terry not showed up to play. He has six points and seven rebounds. He is also so obviously the best player in Carolina blue right now. As badly as this has gone with UNC missing opportunity after opportunity to close the gap during the last 10 minutes when the real Duke offense decided to show up, I am amazed they are only down five points. The first five minutes of the second half will be crucial in establishing some control of the tempo really getting back even with the Devils. Taking the crowd out of it would be helpful as well as wearing this Duke team down. UNC can afford to keep things close until that 10-12 minute mark of the second half when they generally begin running hog wild against a fatiuged team. If Roy follows the standard formula from the season then the ball will get pounded inside early and often to try and get some easy shots. If they can keep Scheyer from ripping them to shreds from outside then they can get control of the game.
10:08 PM: 2nd half...
10:10 PM: Scheyer is killing us.
10:11 PM: The only hope here is Duke does wear down, other than that it does not look promising.
10:12 PM: Packer obviously thinks Wright should have kept running wide open even though Henderson was two steps ahead of him.
10:13 PM: Wow, I am surprised they call that a block given that a Duke player ended up on their back.
10:14 PM: They replayed Nelson's drive and Wright should have done more to stop that one.
10:15 PM: Grab a freaking rebound!
10:16 PM: So even when they get Duke to miss, for reasons that pass all understanding, a UNC player is absent from anywhere near the basket. And it is not box outs by Duke, they are seem to be somewhere else. Duke up nine at the first TV timeout.
10:20 PM: I think Hendeson probably fouled Terry there and it was not called.
10:21 PM: McRoberts with three fouls.
10:22 PM: Duke 50 UNC 43. Zoubek is back in and they really need to expoit him.
10:23 PM: More clock problems. Colored me shocked. Sooner or later UNC is going to find themselves down 15 here because they cannot take advantage of the opportunities handed them.
10:25 PM: Wow, we finally closed it back to five. Henderson should have let that go, I am not sure it would not have hit the front of the rim.
10:28 PM: Does anyone know why Lawson is not in the game? Anyone?
10:30 PM: McRoberts just got his fourth foul. I am not sure how much that hurts other than Zoubek being completely worthless on the offensive end. Then again McRoberts only has four points.
10:33 PM: UNC within three now. Crucial few minutes here except Scheyer is killing us.
10:34 PM: Miller for three...about time.
10:35 PM: Missed a chance to tie.
10:36 PM: Tied game! This is that point where the opposing team starts to falter from fatigue.
10:37 PM: Oh good. Scheyer has three fouls and McRoberts is coming in with four fouls.
10:38 PM: Okay why are we lauding the defense of a guy(McRoberts) who is guarding a player(Lawson) a foot and half shorter than him.
10:39 PM: WILL SOMEONE PLEASE GUARD SCHEYER!!! HOW MANY OPEN LOOKS ARE YOU GOING TO GIVE HIM!!!
10:41 PM: Great now we are going to give him three free throws...They just cannot get over the hump no matter how hard they try.
10:44 PM: Holy cow he missed one. Might have been a good foul after all given how hot he has been. Misses two
10:45 PM: Tied again. UNC really needs a stop and the lead to change to tide a bit.
10:46 PM: Lead!
10:47 PM: Henderson is an idiot that is his second goal tend when it was obviously a goal tend.
10:48 PM: UNC is looking fresher which is generally the point of all that depth.
10:51 PM: I am still not understanding why Lawson is out of the game so much in deference to Frasor. They took the lead with him in and then took him out now the lead is down to one and Nelson after the TV timeout will have a chance to give Duke the lead back.
10:54 PM: Duke is tired 2-9 from the FT line. Nelson was short so he compensated on the second one and it was long.
10:55 PM: Duke is toast and UNC needs to put the foot on the throat and push down. UNC up three, Duke ball.
10:56 PM: Scheyer has four fouls now. UNC can really start to salt this one away here. Duke is tired and has major foul trouble. Miller hits one FT and misses the second. UNC up four.
10:57 PM: They actually found Tyler's contact lens out there on that court? I can't find my wife's when she drops it in one spot.
10:59 PM: Knife in the chest. Lawson blows past Paulus, gets fouled and hits the basket. Now a chance to go up seven. Done. 1:45 left.
11:00 PM: Depth. Kills. Not that this is ever over unless that clock says 0:00 or two seconds after it says that. Of course you need to hit the free throws or that kind of thing happens. Scheyer again shot and the foul...UNC only up four now.
11:02 PM: How does Lawson do that? Oh, he has mad vertical. Duke tips in to close it to four with 37 seconds left. Now it becomes an issue of hitting free throws.
11:03 PM: Scheyer has fouled out. Heck of a game from him. I am fairly sure I will be plenty annoyed with him by 2010.
11:05 PM: Hansbrough puts the Heels up six with 30 seconds(32 seconds Cameron Time) left in the game.
11:07 PM: Okay but Paulus made no attempt to steal the ball so by definition it is an intentional foul. UNC up seven with 12 seconds left.
11:08 PM: You it is really sad for Duke fans to act this way and go through sleeping outside for a month only to see your team beaten.
11:09 PM: Duke exending the game...legally anyway. Closes it to four with six seconds left.
11:11 PM: Paulus fouls out...very cool.
11:12 PM: Packer is debating the fact that UNC considered K the coach of record for the two games in 1995 and Duke says Pete Gaudet is the coach of record. Guess what Billy the NCAA had a rule and K got a waiver.
11:13 PM HEELS WIN!!!! 79-73
It was not pretty nor was it anything to brag about. UNC played ugly and only because they have more players than Roy knows what to do with, they wore Duke down and won the game. That being said there is nothing sweeter than the following:
1. Two game winning streak at Cameron
2. Three game losing streak for Duke
3. Duke is 5-5 in the ACC
4. UNC keeps pace in the loss column with BC and UVa.
5. Oh yeah...we beat Duke!!!
Analysis later...