KNOXVILLE, Tenn. -- The Duke Invitational will be back in session this weekend in Charlotte.
The men's basketball team will find itself in a familiar situation this weekend at the Charlotte Coliseum when the Blue Devils (27-5) will play in their seventh Final Four in the past nine years.
By virtue of a 69-60 victory over Purdue (29-5) Saturday in the NCAA Southeast Regional finals, Duke will take on East Regional champ Florida this Saturday in a national semifinal.
West champion Arizona plays Midwest survivor Arkansas in the other semifinal, with the winners to meet Monday night for the national championship.
"We've been fortunate to play in a number of regional championship games, and this was as good as any we've played in," said Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski, who is 7-0 in regional finals.
The Blue Devils, who were the No. 2 seed in the Southeast behind top-seeded Purdue, got 19 points apiece from Antonio Lang and Jeff Capel, 15 points from Cherokee Parks and another brilliant all-around game from Grant Hill, who was voted the region's most outstanding player.
Aside from the phenomenal offensive outbursts by Capel and Lang, the story of this Duke regional championship was defense. The Blue Devils again demonstrated that nobody does it better.
"You don't win big games in this tournament on offense," Krzyzewski said. "You do it on defense."
All evening long Lang, Hill and Parks dogged -- pun intended -- Purdue's star forward Glenn Robinson, who led the nation with a 30 points per game scoring average, and guard Cuonzo Martin, a 44 percent three-point shooter this season.
Robinson exploded for 44 points in the Boilermakers' Sweet 16 win over Kansas but was held in check by Duke's switching man-to-man defense. Robinson scored just 13 points on 6-of-22 against Duke. It was his lowest point total of the season.
"I thought we could limit Robinson a little bit, but stopping him was just impossible," Krzyzewski said.
The Blue Devils did not forget about Martin, either. The junior, who had burned Kansas for eight three-pointers and 29 points, never could get clean looks at the basket and finished with 12 points and two three-pointers.
"I guess you could say it's the best defense we've seen all year because it was the biggest game of the year," Purdue head coach Gene Keady said.
"We showed today that defense is what wins big games," Duke guard Chris Collins said. "To be able to come out and limit what Glenn Robinson can do is great."
For most of the first half, it didn't matter what the Big Dog was doing on the court, because his teammates -- dubbed the Little Puppies -- were picking up the scoring slack. Robinson scored Purdue's first basket of the game, but reserve Ian Stanback and guard Matt Waddell scored 12 of the Boilermakers' next 18 points to spark a Purdue rally.
When Martin nailed a transition three-point basket from the left wing with just under 10 minutes left in the first half, Purdue led 23-16 and most of the capacity crowd of 23,370 at Thompson-Boling Arena were roaring their approval.
The Boilermakers eventually pushed their lead to 10 points with 7:43 remaining in the half before the Blue Devils reigned them back in.
"I thought halfway through the first half that we had a chance to take control, but it didn't turn out that way," Keady said. "All of a sudden the bottom fell out."
Indeed, Duke came back into the game with surprising swiftness. The Blue Devils made an 11-0 run sparked by aggressive inside play and a technical foul on the frustrated Purdue bench. Duke started getting the ball inside to Parks and Lang, who scored nine straight points before a Hill jumper put Duke back on top, 28-27.
The half ended in a 32-32 tie, a situation not unlike the one the Blue Devils found themselves in against Marquette in Thursday's regional semifinal. After falling behind 9-0, Duke had fought to within one at the break against the Warriors before roaring to the lead early in the second half.
Against Purdue, Duke had to overcome a similar deficit before halftime: Would its second-half response be the same?
Jeff Capel will take that question, thank you very much.
The Duke freshman guard, who has had an outstanding NCAA Tournament, was the difference in the second half as the Blue Devils pulled away before the first TV timeout.
Capel, who had scored six first-half points, nailed a three-pointer on Duke's first possession after the break, an 18-foot jumper on the third and another trey minutes later to help the Blue Devils open up a 44-36 lead.
"Their experience helped in the second half," said Waddell, who was Purdue's leading scorer with 16 points. "They turned it up a notch and we couldn't."
On the day, Capel was a perfect 3-for-3 from behind the arc, but that stat doesn't begin to assess the Fayetteville native's contribution against Purdue.
When Hill, Duke's primary ball-handler, picked up his fourth foul with 10 minutes left to play and the Blue Devils leading by five, the Boilermakers seemed poised to make a run.
"I thought when Grant got his fourth foul, actually I didn't know what to think," Krzyzewski said. "But what I saw after that was some of the best basketball we've played all year."
It was basketball led by Capel, who took over running the offense while Hill sat out for almost seven minutes. Capel turned the ball over only once on the day and made several key plays in the final five minutes to ice the win.
The most spectacular play of the day came with 3:20 remaining and Duke ahead by six. Just after the final TV timeout, Capel was dribbling on the left side with the shot clock winding down and trying to enter the ball into Lang in the post. One behind-the-back-through-two-defenders pass later, Lang was putting in a basket for an eight-point lead.
"[The pass] was just instinct," said Capel, who was the only freshman named to the all-region team. "I felt like it was the only I could make the pass. Luckily, it got through."
The closest the Boilermakers got the rest of the way was eight points. After Capel threw one down off a pass from Collins that gave Duke a 67-55 lead, the Blue Devil bench -- led by an ecstatic Coach K -- realized they were going to Charlotte.
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