The Nightmare Before Christmas

64-62, Overtime, Madison Square Garden, Dejuan Blair fouled out with 20 rebounds, what's the one thing you cannot, under any circumstance, allow? A 3-pointer. Once Levance Fields takes that ball and dribbles through his legs a few times with absolutely no urgency, you have to realize he's going for the win there. I did, my brother did, and 25,0000 other fans did and you know what, I think Coach K thought that as well? Why else would he have David McClure, a guy 4 inches taller than Fields, defending Fields? Yet, Fields still gets off a good look, albeit a fade away, and the rest is bitter history for every Duke fan.

Game Breakdown: First of all, I can't stand any of these so-called Duke fans that go to these games at the Garden. They know absolutely nothing about this team, this program, and the University as a whole. When Duke is up by double-digits especially in the 1st Half, please don't rub it in to the opposing fans because more than likely, Duke will at least make it interesting or worse yet, lose the game. I've seen a million times whether on tv or unfortunately, in person. The first ever Duke game I ever went to was in 2003 at the Garden against a beat up, ragged St. John's team with Marcus "Man" Hatten ended in similar heartbreak. Duke had dominated the game throughout but inconsistent shooting kept the game between 12-16 points for most of the 2nd Half. At 71-60 with 2:30 left in the game, Dahntay Jones was called for a non-existant 5th and final foul and all of a sudden the crowd and the tide of the game began to change. The St. John's fans, who before this point, you had a better chance of having a face-to-face with Osama Bin Laden than finding them in the stadium, began to go crazy. My brother, who circa 2001-2004, was the biggest jinx in the world, turned around at 71-63 and screamed out "You can't press Duke, they have too many good ballhandlers" What happened? Duke turned over the ball 4 consecutive possessions, St. John's tied the game up at 71-71 and then after Marcus Hatten absolutely molested Daniel Ewing with 5 seconds left, a molestation that would make Michael Jackson blush might I add, he ran down the floor, missed a layup at the buzzer, but again, a phantom foul call came with no time left. Hatten hit a free throw at the buzzer and Duke was 0-1 with yours truly in attendance. They then went on to win the next 9 I was in attendance for (7 in the Garden, 1 in Continental Airlines Arena, 1 in Cameron) until it was bookended with another tough loss on Thursday night. Imagine that, Duke is 9-2 while I'm in attendance, with the two losses coming by a combined total of 2 points.

How many more double-digit leads blown do I have to rehash? VCU last year, Indiana in 2002, UCONN in 2004 to name a few... The problem with this Pittsburgh game is that it exposed Duke's biggest weakness, rebounding, to the tune of being outrebounded by 17. Blair, who vowed to make the Devils pay for not recruiting him, really stuck it to the K man and his squad with 15 points and 20 rebounds. To me, Duke didn't zone enough. Pittsburgh, outside of Fields, missed all of their 3 point attempts and frankly, weren't even close. That's not to say the Blue Devils were any better. They missed 15 3-point attempts, including Sheyer's desperation heave at the buzzer. Sheyer, who couldn't throw the ball into the Atlantic, actually led the team in rebounds with 12, which also shows this teams immense vulnerability. Greg Paulus, who has had probably his 2 best games as a Duke player in the Garden as a frosh and soph, was dreadful with only 3 points on 2 shots and he had 5 turnovers, including a number of costly ones at the end of the game.

Positives: Gerald Henderson is scary good and when I say scary, I mean scary because his mid-range jumper is NBA ready and I don't want to lose him after only two years. He kept the Dukies in the game, with jumper after jumper and I really thought he had the winner at the end of regulation. Kyle Singler also showed me a lot, considering the pounding he took down low. Even with that, he had 17 points, including a 3-pointer that tied it at 58-58 with 1 minute left in regulation. I still can't believe he missed the tip in at the buzzer though. The positive you take out of this game is that Pitt is a Top 10 program, they were a perfect mismatch for Duke, Duke played Pitt's game in the half court all night, the crowd in the 2nd Half was Pro-Pitt and yet with all that, they still should've and could've won the game on a number of occassions. So, it was a tough loss to swallow but a fade away 3 at the buzzer against a Top 10 team on a neutral court is not exactly a loss to Gardner Webb at home (that's for you Patrick Patterson). I bet you're regretting that decision now. Kentucky can't even beat Houston and it's not like they have Clyde Drexler and the Dream on that team.

Duke will bounce back from this and hopefully gain a little more toughness. I feel bad for the Big Red of Cornell because when Duke comes back to Cameron, they will spank them with no mercy...

Prediction: Duke 104 Cornell 60