The 2018-19 Duke Blue Devils are a team that’s going to be remembered for a long time. Even so, what they do in the NCAA tournament will go a long way towards determining their legacy.
Regardless of what happens over the next three weeks, Duke’s chapter in the story of the 2018-19 college basketball season is assured to be hefty. How could it not be?
The opening night smashing of Kentucky, losing in Maui for the first time ever in a classic against Gonzaga, losing Tre Jones, Cam Reddish’s heroics to beat Florida State, the historic comeback against Louisville, the shoe blowout seen ‘round the world, the ACC tournament thriller against UNC followed by the title a night later, R.J. Barrett being as good as advertised, Zion, Zion, Zion, Zion, Zion.
Because of all these things, this Duke team is guaranteed to be remembered and discussed for years to come. That doesn’t mean their legacy has been cemented. Hell, it isn’t even on solid footing. That’s no shot at the Blue Devils, it’s simply recognition of the way this beautifully cruel sport is set up.
People still talk about the Fab Five. They talk about the long shorts, the merchandise sales, how three of them went on to become stars in the NBA, and how their legacy changed the college game. They also still talk about the back-to-back national championship game losses. They certainly still talk about the ending of the second one.
People also still talk about the 2014-15 Kentucky team that became the first in college basketball history to start a season 38-0. People never talk about that team without at least mentioning that the Wildcats didn’t become the first team to reach 40-0.
So yes, Zion Williamson, R.J. Barrett and the entire 2018-19 Duke Blue Devil team will be talked about for years to come. The next three weeks will determine a large part of the way they’re talked about.
If anyone knows about how four (or even 11) months of greatness can be wiped away in a single afternoon or evening, it’s Mike Krzyzewski.
Coach K, the man now commonly referred to as “the modern day John Wooden,” was once Coach K, annual choke artist. A quick Google search of “Mike Krzyzewski” “the big one” and “1991” simultaneously confirms this fact and sends the searcher into a bizarro world.
Nearly every story written about Duke’s 1991 national championship game triumph over Kansas — which came two days after the Blue Devils stunned overwhelming favorite and previously mentioned UNLV — features some reference to Krzyzewski’s entrenched reputation for not being able to get the job done on the biggest stage. The very first question posed to Coach K during the postgame press conference following his team’s 72-65 triumph over Kansas was about “having the monkey off your back.” YouTube videos featuring pregame and postgame coverage of Duke’s wins over both UNLV and Kansas that year confirm Krzyzewski’s failures in four previous Final Four trips was the unrivaled focus of the college basketball world’s attention in 1991.
For an entire generation of sports fans, this is something of a revelation. Krzyzewski is now as compatible with success of the highest degree as Bill Belichick, Nick Saban, or Phil Jackson. Among countless other accomplishments, his resume is comprised of five national championships, 12 Final Four appearances, and three Olympic gold medals as the coach of USA Basketball.
When Krzyzewski finally broke through in 1991, the man he deprived of a first championship was Roy Williams. This would prove to be the first chapter of Williams’ own “can’t win the big one” story, one which would wind up being even lengthier and more well-known than Coach K’s. He ultimately broke through in 2005, and has since enjoyed the same career and narrative evolution as Krzyzewski.
Every coach who is now synonymous with college basketball success of the highest degree — Krzyzewski, Williams, John Calipari, Bill Self, Jay Wright — was once synonymous with something else. The narrative is always the narrative until it becomes something else, and that something else is almost always something that bears no resemblance to its past form. This is March. It is cruel and it is unforgiving, unless you conquer it.
Every memorable team that had the thrill of an overwhelmingly successful season completely curtailed by one out of character performance wants to believe that the lasting image of their group will be different. That they’ll be the team whose strengths were so strong that they’ll outweigh the recency effect of the performance that will forever serve as their most recent.
The outside world always knows better. No one remembers the greatness that it takes to get to a point where “imperfect” becomes something more than an assumed character trait that was there since the beginning. No one remembers the 2007 New England Patriots, the 1990-91 UNLV Runnin’ Rebels or the 2014-15 Kentucky Wildcats without remembering David Tyree’s catch, Duke’s semifinal stunner or Frank Kaminsky and Sam Dekker ruining Calipari’s quest for perfection a moment later.
The opening night smashing of Kentucky, losing in Maui for the first time ever in a classic against Gonzaga, losing Tre Jones, Cam Reddish’s heroics to beat Florida State, the historic comeback against Louisville, the shoe blowout seen ‘round the world, the ACC tournament thriller against UNC followed by the title a night later, R.J. Barrett being as good as advertised, Zion, Zion, Zion, Zion, Zion.
We’re going to remember that stuff forever. That’s been established. The question becomes will those events be remembered in concert with the stunning loss that closed the book on all this, or as a string of defining moments for one of the best college basketball teams we’ve seen in the past couple of decades? The answer starts to reveal itself this week.
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