Madison Square Garden should be just about ready to explode Sunday afternoon when the second-ranked men's basketball team (18-1) heads into "the world's most famous arena" to take on No. 8 St. John's (15-3).
The Blue Devils might just explode along with it. After going through nearly half of the ACC schedule undefeated, a tough task as it is, Duke now has to take on its fourth and final top-10 non-conference opponent in New York before coming back to North Carolina for battles with North Carolina, N.C. State and Maryland.
"This is going to be a tough stretch for us," center Elton Brand said. "Hopefully it will get us prepared for the long run, the end, the ACC and NCAA tournaments. You're going to have to face some tough teams that aren't in your league, and St. John's is definitely a top-10-caliber team. That will help us improve, so hopefully we can go into this game, play well and keep going."
Even with the tough upcoming schedule, the Blue Devils are certainly not taking this game lightly.
"It's not going to be that hard to get excited." Brand said. "We know that they're a good team, a top-flight team, that they're ranked top 10 in the country. We know it's going to be a big contest as far as national TV. I think we'll get pretty pumped for this game. We want to keep improving, so we'll be prepared."
St. John's has surprised almost every prognosticator in the country this year. After losing two of its star players in Felipe Lopez and Zendon Hamilton and starting the season out of the top 25, the Johnnies have had a remarkable run of success.
Their three losses include two defeats in the preseason NIT to Stanford and Purdue and a five-point loss at Miami.
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