Kruse Thoughts on Davidson/Duke

The St. Petersburg Times' Michael Kruse attended Saturday's game against Duke in Charlotte. Kruse is a friend of Will's World and a common alum of The Davidsonian and The Wildcat Report. Here are his thoughts from Saturday:

I stood in the back of K’s presser Saturday afternoon and listened to him say what he said and thought to myself: I’ve heard this before.

“They’re really good.”

Heard it.

“They’re an NCAA team.”

Heard it.

“They’re a very, very good basketball team, coached by one of the best coaches in the country, no doubt about it.”

Heard it.

But something I HADN’T heard post-Duke, not working for the Davidsonian, not working for the ACC Basketball Handbook or ACCToday.com or Basketball America, not watching or reading from afar as nothing more than an interested alum, not EVER:

“Davidson could’ve won.”

So Carolina and Duke have come and gone. I would argue Carolina was a coulda SHOULDA. Duke was just a coulda.

From the haphazard notes I was keeping during the game: shotmaking … Boris miss, miss … Sander miss … Sander missed layup … charge on Steph at 14:00ish … uh oh … Lovedale missed runner … charge at 8:39 Steph … then Paulus 3 … Scheyer 2 … 22-17 … TO McK at 8:02 … good TO.

And so on.

Now I see all the predictable gripes about the refs on this board, but the fact of the matter is this, too: Steph scored 20, yes, but also turned the ball over eight times. Jason was great for the most part but also missed six of his eight free throws. Boris missed a dunk.

That halftime score of 43-32 Duke? It was appropriate.

The most striking thing to me about the Carolina and Duke games, and I watched Carolina on TV, and Duke in person, obviously, was that we played … the way we play. We didn’t play freakishly, flukishly great, or anything close to it. We just played. We played normal.

And yet No. 1 Carolina needed a pro move from a future pro to finish it.

And No. 7 Duke needed a joke of a shot from Paulus. That THING he threw in on the baseline, he makes that once out of 10 times, maybe twice. It was ridiculous live. It was totally preposterous later that night on the highlights on TV.

But my question for all of you here, and ultimately, I suppose, the point of this post, is, well: IS THIS GOOD ENOUGH?

Let me put it another way:

Still having fun?

I started really thinking about this after talking with Kyle Whelliston at halftime. He said he was there to do another something on Davidson. The two possibilities heading into Saturday’s game: (1) Davidson as “conquering hero,” to use his term, or (2) “What’s the matter with Davidson?”

See the end of Sorensen’s column Sunday?

“Here’s the best thing about Davidson.

“There was a time when almost beating the Blue Devils and Tar Heels would have excited the team and its fans. That was long ago.”

Kinda makes me happy to read that. Also kinda makes me sad.

This IS exciting. This SHOULD BE exciting. We lost by a combined 10 points, on a neutral floor, to two of the best teams in the country. What’s the MATTER with Davidson?

Don’t get me wrong. I want them to win, get over that hump, whatever. I want McKillop to win one of these games because I think he’s an awesome ambassador for my alma mater, and because we’re lucky to have him, and because all three of his children decided to go to Davidson, and because I think that’s maybe the coolest thing about the man and his relationship with the institution. I want Matheny to win one of these because he went to Davidson, and because he’s been at Davidson, and because he’s STAYED at Davidson, and because that’s worth a lot, because it’s stuff like that that makes a place what it is.

But I don’t want them to win for me. They owe me nothing.

Maybe that’s splitting hairs. I don’t know.

One last thing, though: Last Thursday night, I went to a Davidson alumni event in Tampa. Tom Ross was there. These things are always the same, a little cheesy, totally formulaic, but at the same time I’m always glad when I go, because while you’re eating shrimp and drinking wine and meeting doctors and lawyers and watching that parade of blue blazers and khakis, you listen to the president give his little status update, about how smart and accomplished this year’s freshmen are, and how good Chambers looks now, and somehow it’s exactly what I want to hear, because it makes me think about things that make me feel good.

I was born outside Los Angeles. I grew up outside Boston. Since I graduated, seven years ago, I’ve lived in Charlotte, Chapel Hill, Durham, Wellesley, Mass., Warwick, N.Y., Spring Hill, Fla., Tampa and Land O’Lakes, Fla.

Which, bear with me, is my way of explaining why I got in my car Friday night to drive 569 miles to go see the Wildcats play, win or lose, past the palm trees, away from Florida’s loose, sandy soil, up toward all that rich red dirt.

Sweet Caroline video

I was really worried that this song would get old after a while. As you can see from these videos, it still gets us Davidson people pretty pumped up. Note the highlights being shown on the big screen during that timeout.

Wildcats fall to #7 Duke, 79-73

Photo by Tim Cowie

Wildcat fans might be going home today with continued frustration about Davidson's inability to knock off a Top 25 team despite coming so close. However, today's 79-73 loss to no. 7 Duke was Davidson's best showing as a team all season.

The Wildcats took then top-seeded UNC to its final possession back in November before Wayne Ellington hit the game-sealing field goal to hold off Davidson. Today, Greg Paulus hit a baseline jumper with under a minute to go to extend Duke's lead to seven. The Wildcats were unable to pull it closer than four in the final minute despite a late three pointer from Stephen Curry.

The Wildcats answered several important questions today that were still lingering in many people's minds after the Western Michigan and Appalachian State games, despite nearly letting the game get away in the first half.

Jason Richards played poorly in the first half scoring only two points and going 0-5 from the free throw line. Thomas Sander was only 1-5 from the field and Curry had two fouls and four turnovers. The Blue Devils had their largest lead at 16 after Jon Scheyer hit three free throws for being fouled on a three-point attempt with 3:33 remaining. With Curry in foul trouble, the Wildcats were on the verge of letting the game get away from them, much like they did in the teams' last two meetings in Durham. But Davidson finished the half with eight straight points in the paint and cut Duke's lead to 11 at the break.

Like they did against UNC two weeks ago, the Wildcats opened the second half on a 11-3 run, capped off by a Jason Richards three pointer. This happened despite Stephen Curry picking up his third foul on a dubious charging call to start the half. The Blue Devils never let Davidson pull even, however, as they continued to create open shots and answer every Wildcat run with a three-pointer or a big play.

Duke nearly broke the game open again with 10 minutes remaining when Kyle Singler found DeMarcus Nelson for an alley-oop dunk that put Duke up 13. But Davidson battled back once again kept the game close until the very end.

Although Davidson had yet another agonizing "close but no cigar" game, this one was different than most. The Wildcats were actually outmatched by a superior team that played a terrific game. Any spectator that would argue that Duke did not play well is insulting both Davidson and Duke themselves. The Blue Devils played like a championship team and never faltered, even when Davidson made runs. The Wildcats, conversely, proved to be one of few teams that didn't let the patented "Duke mo" take them out of the game. Davidson never quit and the final score represented that.

Davidson played this game very well as they learned to find offense through schemes that didn't involve Stephen Curry. Jason Richards found his shooting touch in the second half as he finished with a monster line of 14 points (12 in the second stanza) and 11 assists. Boris Meno and Andrew Lovedale combined for 22 points and 14 rebounds, while Thomas Sander contributed seven points despite his foul trouble. Duke only outrebounded Davidson by 1, and the Wildcats had the edge on the offensive glass (13-10). Even though Duke had several monster blocks that shifted momentum to their favor, the Wildcats were credited with two more on the game, showing how far Davidson has come in terms of having an athletic post presence.

Not only did Davidson respond well to the momentum swings that Duke produced, they also showed poise when several important calls didn't go their way. Stephen Curry was put in foul trouble early on for several charging calls (all four of his fouls were charges) that might not have needed to be called. Curry was twisting his body on the way to the basket in order to create less contact than a full on drive, and yet the referees seemed to fault him for being out of control. The refs mostly came under fire for an erroneous possession call when Paulus knocked out a loose ball under Davidson's basket and the ref changed his initial call to give it to Duke. The stadium officials replayed the play on the video board showing Paulus touch it, and the entire lower bowl clad in red went apey. But even with the poor officiating, Davidson played hard and played well, making several big shots when they needed to.

If the four-point loss to UNC was a profound statement about how far this program has come, then today's six-point loss to Duke was an exclamation point.

The Davidson fans showed incredible emotion throughout the game and continued to elevate the aspirations of Davidson's program. While many might have written the Cats off for losing to Western Michigan, today's contest showed that great basketball teams cannot truly be measured by a single forty-minute contest. The entire season is played for a reason. The NCAA tournament has six rounds for a reason. This isn't college football where they handpick two storied programs to show down in one game with all of the marbles on the table. Davidson again proved that they deserve to be a part of the national conversation of 2007-2008 college basketball.

Davidson vs. #7 Duke, 12 p.m., ESPNU

I won't be doing live blogging today. I apologize. I will, however, put up a story with recap and observations from the student section end zone area. Before I head down to Charlotte, I will leave you with a few thoughts.

-While Duke is definitely a better team right now than UNC was on Nov. 14, I would argue that Davidson has gotten better as well. They will have more teaching points for team huddles ("remember against WMU when we didn't flex our muscles on the post?" or "remember against ASU when we responded to their run and shut down their mo?"). Duke is an excellent team, however, and Davidson will have to be clicking on all cylinders to have a chance at the end.

-Davidson needs to take advantage of Duke's willingness to run out on defensive rebounds. The Blue Devils will no doubt get several transition opportunities off of rebounds, but Davidson can work to negate those points by attacking the offensive glass and using their size advantage for some easy second chance points.

-Jason Richards will be a huge key in this game. He didn't produce much offensively against App (1-9 FG, 2 pts). He will need to lead with more than just setting everyone else up and keeping the offense under control. I would also love to see Thomas get some opportunities with his back to the basket. I have a feeling that Duke will not double team him for fear of our three-point shooting.

-The crowd might be even more in Davidson's favor today. All of the same "rowdy" Davidson students will be back plus there are reports of at least several hundred UNC fans who bought tickets to this game immediately after their Nov. 14 contest with Davidson, only to cheer against Duke (a la 2005 NCAA Second Round in Charlotte Coliseum).

Taking the representation too far

Throughout these first few weeks of the season, Davidson College has emerged on many people's radars around the country because of the men's basketball program. A quick glance at a USA Today or ESPN.com or the bottom line of any sports show would find Davidson highly praised for its academics and highly ranked for its athletics. In fact, I have to write an article for this weekend about the way that Davidson basketball's media exposure has been good for the College as well.

While I certainly accept the reality that if Davidson makes a run in the NCAA Tournament or continues to make headlines, the admission applications would rise, alumni giving might be sparked and the athletic program's potential recruits would be awed. However, there is a part of this premise that I don't particularly feel comfortable with. How can a group of fifteen guys completely represent an academic institution through their shooting touch and defensive aggressiveness?

Are you really telling me that there are so many financial, social, and potentially academic consequences riding on a game-tying three point attempt by Jason Richards in the closing seconds of a basketball contest? We have all been suckered into accepting and proclaiming the affirmative because we know that Jason will hit it...and because, as far as we can tell, this equation only points to the good. If the three rims out, we haven't lost anything in the attempt. Sure let's put all of our identity on the shoulders of this basketball team.

However, I am more concerned at the larger premise surrounding this issue. That is, I believe that we currently place way too much emphasis on representatives of a larger group or institution, whether in sports or otherwise.

For example, are Davidson students better basketball players on the whole because their team beat the Appalachian State team last Saturday. No...I wouldn't say that. Are North Carolina or Florida or Ohio State or USC the best universities in the country because of the success of their athletic programs? Not necessarily. On the flip side, are Davidson students all punks because of the inappropriate actions of a few in post-game scuffle in downtown Charlotte? Definitely not.

However, all of these cases have been made implicitly. My friends and I definitely left ASU's Holmes Center on Monday with an air of invincibility and swagger, while most of our student peers in yellow were hanging their heads. Did either of us have anything to do with that game? No way. Curry's 38 points and App's offensive ineptitude was not a reflection of the relative merit of our collective fandom. Yet both groups seemed to accept it to be so.

This is a similar situation with these athletic powerhouses that rule the NCAA championships from sport to sport. Is that institution, and its fans by proxy, that much better than any other college or university? Not necessarily, it just has more athletic money which means better facilities, higher recruiting budgets and more perks for prospective athletes. If I decide to don a UNC sweatshirt one day and watch every game as they advance to another Final Four, am I an inherently better fan or person than I would have been if I would have kept my Davidson sweatshirt on? Of course not. But we've come to let our teams reflect us. Their wins and losses give or take away power from us in relation to one another. UNC's win over Davidson does not make my friend at Chapel Hill better than me, nor would it make me better than him had the Wildcats converted on a few easy layups and dunks. While you might think that my terms are preposterous and that no fans really accept them, I would advise you to look a little closer under the surface. We all love to compare ourselves with each other and athletic superiority, while taken lightly on the surface, forms more of the core of supporters' self-identities than we acknowledge.

Finally, I'd like to mention how irresponsible over-representation can be in terms of bad behavior. When Michael Vick was arrested for dog fighting, there were white people who, publicly or privately, made judgments in their head about what they considered to be the violent nature of all black people. Conversely, when outspoken groups like PETA blew the issue out of proportion, many black people pointed to America's white population and accused them of only being concerned about "dogs and yoga."

Last week, Davidson Dean of Students Tom Shandley wrote an email to the entire student body, asking them to represent Davidson in a positive manner at this weekend's Duke game. The email included a letter from a concerned alum saying that Davidson students were misrepresenting the college by being intoxicated and getting in a scuffle with several older UNC fans after the game. The alum's letter condemned the Davidson student body for being immature and accused "Davidson of exhibiting hostile behavior never before seen...not even from Duke." While I appreciate the fact that the involved Davidson students were in the wrong, and I also acknowledge the absurdity of this particular alumnus' fervor for tattle-telling (he tried to take a pic of the students on his camera phone), I am most concerned about the language used regarding representation. What does it mean that "Davidson exhibited hostile behavior.."? Since when did the University of Duke become such a haven of violence to which all other violence should be compared (the Davidson alum had children at UNC, hence the Duke reference as a yardstick for all things bad)? How can the actions of such a select few come to essentialize the nature of an entire institution?

I do not intend to come across as naive in this post. If you wear a shirt that says Davidson and you do something that is reprehensible, rightly or wrongly, the institution of Davidson and everyone involved in that institution gets held accountable. That is what people do most of the time. However, I hope that we can all be just a bit more careful with how we understand the difference between individual actions and critiques upon the wider groups that they associate themselves with.

Despite what group representations might infer, I am not overly obsessed with domesticated animals, I am not a violent person nor a drunk, I am not an inferior sports fan to someone from Chapel Hill nor am I better at basketball than the guy sitting behind me in Boone, NC. You should make a judgment about me based upon what I truly am, not just who I cheer for.

UNC-Duke not all that important

Every once in a blue moon, I wish that I didn’t attend college in the state of NC. It is usually a boon for me to look around and see all of the great things that North Carolina offers a resident: an incredibly expanding job market in several of the state’s burgeoning urban centers, one of the nation’s leading gatherings of intellectual and cultural growth, a vast diversity of landscapes and populations, and finally, excellent sports traditions, especially in college basketball.

However, in the past few weeks, I have gazed upon these basketball giants and wondered where their perspective has gone. Where is the humility?

In last week’s regular season finale between Duke and UNC, Duke’s Gerald Henderson delivered the elbow shot heard around the world to UNC’s Tyler Hansbrough. As soon as replays of the infamous play were scrolling across the screen, TV analysts like Billy Packer were making declarative statements while North Carolina fans shouted death threats at the Duke coaching staff from several feet away.

Throughout the next week, North Carolina papers ran arguments and counter-arguments about the intent, harshness and punishment of Henderson’s foul. For many followers of North Carolina-Duke basketball, this issue was the most important thing on their minds when they woke up. Everything was black vs. white, or in this case, sky blue versus royal blue.

Fans of North Carolina and Duke, however, have failed to recognize that the rest of the country really does not care about their petty little arguments. The rest of the country does not see college basketball revolving around these built-up institutions of all things that are supposedly great about sports, rivalry, and success.

When the rest of the country looks at North Carolina and Duke, they don’t see greatness, they pomposity.

Hold short before mincing my words, however. I am not saying the North Carolina and Duke have not set the bar for success and intensity of support for college basketball. The two schools have combined for fourteen Final Four appearances since 1990. Duke’s Cameron Crazies have been copied and emulated at numerous schools around the country.

What I am saying is this: the rest of the basketball world is realizing that they can do things just as well as these two schools, and they don’t like being told that Carolina-Duke is all that matters.

As a matter of fact, states like Florida matter. That’s why the ACC elected to give Tampa Bay a chance to host the ACC tournament, much to the chagrin of North Carolinians who protest that the tournament is not in their back yard for once.

Some of the best basketball is being played in the Midwest this year where schools like Ohio State, Kansas, Wisconsin and Southern Illinois are putting together strong bids for late runs in the tournament.

The rivalry games of Virginia/Virginia Tech, Texas/Texas A&M, and Tennessee/Florida have arguably had even more impact on the landscape of college basketball, and their respective groups of fans have certainly brought their collective intensity and love of college basketball to bear.

Despite their talented young players, legendary coaches, and stubbornly die-hard fans, neither North Carolina nor Duke is the best team in the country this season. Nor are their programs so important that the rest of us should kneel in wonder. So let’s bring home a little more humility and less self-importance to the Tar Heel state. The rest of the country is waiting.

Moving On

You knew it was coming. You know that a die-hard Clemson fan like myself doesn't just let such a situation as the ".6 controversy" go by without a blog entry. Around the blogging world right now, there are talks of conspiracy, positing that Coach K is satan incarnate, and repeated jokes about Duke Lacrosse.

In the midst of everything that has gone down, especially the recent press release from the ACC stating that a mistake was made, I have some self-congratulatory thoughts about Oliver Purnell.

Back in the fall, there was a huge controversy in college football over an onside kick call in the Oklahoma-Oregon game. The Sooner faithful were convinced that they had been screwed and video evidence confirmed that they were right. Everyone in the entire state, from the fans to the coaches to the political leaders, were so outraged that they made public calls for justice, including an official reversal of the game's outcome.

Although the Duke-Clemson should have gone to overtime, Oliver Purnell has not said anything to anyone. The Clemson administration have shown their displeasure and vowed to move on. The Clemson players will show up on Sunday against Virginia and will play their game. All of this is because of a coach who truly understands the game. Purnell knows that there are always 13 players on the basketball court. While some of them are held to higher and more official standards of success, they are still players. Coach Purnell knows that you can't reverse a game's outcome because an opponent made an impossible play, or because a teammate missed an easy play. Why, then should a game be reversed because the officials messed up? They are part of the game, and that's what every player, coach and fan accepts when their team walks on the basketball court.

Coach Purnell demonstrated to the nation that he and his players were above whining and moaning over a mistake. They set an example for youth leagues, parents, and athletes everywhere. Whining isn't a virtue, and sporting outcomes shouldn't be the business of government officials and school presidents. They let it go, and by doing so, they have helped me to let it go. Thanks Coach.