Duke has the second best NCAA tournament winning percentage (.750), trailing only Florida Gulf Coast University.
Why all the hate? Sure, objectively, Duke appears to represent the best of college sports: graduating most of its players, while running a system built around individual freedom and creativity on offense anchored by hard-nosed, relentless teamwork on defense. But in popular mythology, Duke has become an avatar of an overly white, overrated, and overly praised team with an air of entitled superiority.
This national consensus is fascinating, in that it seems utterly blind to what the rest of the planet knows deeply and profoundly: In world politics, we’re Duke. Americans like to think they are Butler, the scrappy unheralded Midwestern underdogs one shot away from a miracle. But let’s be real. The United States is a global superpower, since 1990 the unipolar hegemon atop the global order. In the Middle East it is the imperial hub, a status quo power with deep security and military alliances with almost every regime and global sanctions against the few remaining “rogues.” When the world looks at the United States, it doesn’t see Butler. It sees Duke.
I’m just gonna go ahead and cite this article every time someone gives me shit for loving Duke.
I don’t think anyone will ever understand the magnitude of love and respect I have for this man - especially given his latest reflections on his career at Duke.
Like you thought I was going to let this story go…
The University of North Carolina’s academic fraud scandal has deepened and widened, and local officials have done the sensible thing in locating a fall guy. A brief refresher on why they need one: In December, an investigation officially found what had seemed probable from Julis Peppers’unintentionally public transcript: That many students, but particularly student-athletes, had received GPA-boosting grades in essentially bogus classes. They were passing despite being dramatically beneath the academic standards (as in, suffering from“serious literacy deficits”) that ostensibly prevail at UNC. Former North Carolina Governor Jim Martin led an investigation into UNC that turned up a lone solid mitigating factor for UNC’s administration and athletic department: some “athletic officials and academic support officials” had “raised questions with the Faculty Committee on Athletics” about these easy-A classes in the past. Earlier this month, Martin and his team of investigators retracted that finding.
Taken from Duke Men’s Basketball’s Facebook page:
Duke returned to the top spot in the AP poll on Monday. The Blue Devils have been ranked No. 1 overall five times this season and in 72 weeks since the 1997-98 season. In that span, Duke has been ranked No. 1 in the AP poll eight more weeks than the next two teams (North Carolina – 37, Connecticut – 27) combined. #dukefacts
Boom.
Sexiest bastard in basketball.
Perfect Facebook cover photo come basketball season?
Perhaps.
I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for a fifth title.
Look, I am obsessed with this rivalry. I live for it. But you aren’t going to understand it if you’re just going to a bar in NYC. Go to Tobacco Road and see what you find there, love.
That said, valid point when the woman said “The Tar Heels are nothing without the Blue Devils; the Blue Devils are nothing without the Tar Heels.”
I am bringing this shit BACK. Still qualify as a Duke kid…
I’m just gonna leave this here in anticipation of this weekend. For the record, Duke’s first game is tonight against VA Tech.
I gotta testify, come up in the spot lookin' extra fly...
