It must seem like this season will never end for the men's basketball team.
The Blue Devils, at least for seven of the last nine years, have had seasons that lasted into April for the Final Four. However, this year's season of no end is quite different for Duke.
To begin with, the last time head coach Mike Krzyzewski led the Blue Devils in a game was a Jan. 4 loss to Clemson at home. The team then lost six straight games--a dubious feat last accomplished in the 1938-39 season. Duke also lost nine straight Atlantic Coast Conference games, finally ending the streak in a Feb. 9 win over Georgia Tech.
As if that weren't bad enough, sophomore Greg Newton lost his final appeal of an academic dishonesty conviction on Friday, and was immediately suspended. He will serve a reduced suspension, sitting out the rest of this semester and the first summer session. Newton will be back at Duke in July to take classes during the second term, and if he completes two credits in that term, he will be eligible to play basketball this fall.
Heading into the ACC tournament, the loss of Newton could seriously affect the makeup of this Duke team.
"Greg has basically given us a spark off the bench," assistant coach Mike Brey said. "He can come in and play 12 to 15 minutes and give us a spark or a lift. That's something we've kind of grown accustomed to. Now, all of a sudden, we're thrust into getting [junior forward] Tony Moore ready."
Newton, who averaged 3.9 points and 3.4 rebounds per game, saw time in 25 games this year.
"If you lose a key player, it's a factor," Brey said. "I would hope that some guys who aren't playing as much would look at it as an opportunity to become more a part of it."
The loss of Newton's play off the bench could hurt Duke's chances in the tournament, as it will mean that seniors Cherokee Parks and Erik Meek will not get as many minutes of rest as they have previously enjoyed with Newton's presence. In Saturday's game against North Carolina, Parks played the entire 40 minutes while Meek only sat out for just two minutes.
"Any time you lose a player who's been a key player off the bench, it's going to affect you," Brey said. "I think it affected us Saturday night. Erik played 38 minutes. That's a little long for [him]."
"We don't have as much," Meek said. "The team's just going to have to pull together to pick up the minutes that Newton gave us. [Cherokee and I] may have to play a little bit longer, but I think we'll try to get some good minutes out of Tony."
Since Duke has to battle N.C. State in the play-in game Thursday night, the team's hopes of advancing in the tournament depend on its ability to hold the team together for a tough stretch of back-to-back games.
"If you're talking about winning three or four games in a tournament setting, you're going to need depth," Brey said Sunday night. "When you take a guy away who provided that depth, it's definitely a factor. We need to make it less of a factor in the next few days of practice."
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