NEW YORK - The words poured down from the rafters of Madison Square Garden, the product of gloating Connecticut fans who saw their team down Duke for the second time in eight months.
"0-2, 0-2, 0-2."
For the first time in 41 years, the Blue Devils have opened a season with consecutive losses. Top-ranked UConn used a 13-4 run late in Friday night's rematch of the 1999 national championship game to turn a two-point lead into a 71-66 victory in the consolation game of the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic.
"We wanted to play two outstanding teams here and we did," said Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, whose team fell to No. 13 Stanford Thursday. "We lost to both of them. We have to figure out how we might have won them and how we can help our kids become better."
With 6:46 to play, the 10th-ranked Blue Devils pulled within 54-52 after a foul off the ball wiped out an Albert Mouring three-pointer that would have given the Huskies an eight-point advantage. Mike Dunleavy missed a trey, but Matt Christensen rebounded the ball and Shane Battier capitalized on the second chance with a three, trimming the lead to two.
Mouring quickly swung the momentum back in UConn's favor, drilling his fifth three of the game to kick off a spurt of seven unanswered points for the Huskies (1-1).
Duke made one more run, as another Battier three and a Jason Williams free throw cut the deficit to five with 1:52 to go. But lay-ups by veterans Kevin Freeman and Khalid El-Amin iced the game for UConn.
"Both teams kind of reflected each other," said coach Jim Calhoun, whose Huskies, despite their No. 1 ranking, are dealing with the losses of superstar Richard Hamilton and defensive stopper Rickey Moore. "Both teams are trying to search out who they are. We're fortunate enough that a couple of our guys are a little farther along."
The Blue Devils led by as many as three early in the second half, but the Huskies came back with a 13-4 spurt behind Mouring's shooting and Jake Voskuhl's strong play inside. Duke twice cut that eight-point lead to two, but couldn't get any closer as UConn pulled away down the stretch.
For the second straight night, the Blue Devils had trouble putting the ball in the hoop, hitting just 34 percent of their field-goal attempts. Christensen had the worst of it, missing all seven of his shots despite six offensive rebounds.
After struggling to score in the paint against Stanford, the Blue Devils went with a smaller lineup Friday, as freshman Casey Sanders didn't play at all and classmate Nick Horvath saw only five minutes of action.
"One of the things in the two games is that we just didn't score inside," Krzyzewski said. "How can I as a coach help my players to do a better job inside? I've got to figure out a way where we can do that."
The first half was a low-scoring, back-and-forth affair, as neither team led by more than four. Dunleavy hit three three-pointers, including two in a row midway through the half that gave Duke an 18-15 lead. The Huskies, meanwhile, consistently pushed the ball up the floor for six fast-break points.
Trailing by two with 2:16 to go, the Blue Devils took a 30-second timeout. When Duke returned to the floor, Battier drove through the UConn defense for a thunderous dunk that became a three-point play. Williams then hit his first field goal in six attempts, an NBA-length trey off the inbounds pass to give the Blue Devils a 32-28 lead.
But Mouring responded with his first clutch three of the contest to send the Blue Devils into the lockerroom with a one-point lead.
A night after shooting 2-for-10 in UConn's upset loss to Iowa, Mouring scored a game-high 22 points.
"For him, personally, it was a big game," Calhoun said. "It was a big bounce-back game, because he did not play particularly well in the exhibition or [Thursday] night. Quite frankly, he didn't have a good week of practice either."
El-Amin, the Huskies' star point guard who was embroiled in controversy earlier in the week, hit just 2-of-9 field goals Friday. But UConn pulled out the win behind the offensive heroics of Mouring and Freeman, who added 15 points and 11 rebounds.
Now Duke is 0-2 for the first time since the 1958-59 season, the last before Vic Bubas took over the program and led it to national prominence. The Blue Devils have already matched their loss total of the 1998-99 season.
But if Krzyzewski is panicking, he isn't showing it-the coach was able to joke about his team's plight after the game.
"I think that... you might be asking my athletic director [about the Blue Devils' start]; he might be one of those fair-weather guys," Krzyzewski said. "We have a good group. We'll only get better by playing good people.
"I think we'll be all right."
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