Blue Devils come up big in clutch as usual

MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. - You had to know it was coming.

Sure, Duke was playing some of its worst basketball of the season and Maryland was on top of its game. However, if there was any team that you would bet on to make a huge comeback, it would be this gutsy Duke team, which overcame a 22-point deficit Saturday night to win 95-84 in the national semifinals.

"Duke's a great team," Maryland coach Gary Williams said. "We played great to get to that 22-point lead. I knew they'd make a run, but I thought we had enough to sustain it."

So how were the Blue Devils able to engineer the most daunting comeback in Final Four history?

Well, for starters, they received a lift from their unheralded players to initiate the turnaround in the latter stages of the first half and to uphold it in the second half. Nate James, who had gone virtually unnoticed in Duke's NCAA tournament games thus far, provided a huge spark off the bench. James constantly crashed the boards, pumped up the Blue Devil faithful and knocked down some big jump shots that stemmed the Terrapin tide.

And sophomore center Carlos Boozer was invaluable, fouling out Maryland center Lonny Baxter and scoring 19 points, his best outing since returning from a broken foot last weekend.

"I think Carlos and Casey [Sanders] did an excellent job on defense," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "I think [Baxter] had a tough shooting day, but it had a lot to do with the way Casey and Carlos fought him continually. There really was no science. We were just trying to make him score over us. I give a lot of credit to those guys for fighting."

So the stage for a monumental comeback was set. But this Blue Devil team goes as its superstars go, and at least one of them needed to step up if Duke wanted any chance to win. Shane Battier was the first to rise to the occasion.

One player who did exactly that was the second component of Duke's All-America tandem, sophomore Jason Williams. Williams struggled mightily in the first half, connecting on 1-of-7 shots and only recording one assist, but managed to regain his composure in the final 20 minutes.

"The first half, I was trying to call to many plays," Jason Williams said. "The second half, I came out and was just playing and having fun."

Despite the fact that he never got things going from beyond the arc, Williams started taking the ball to the hole more aggressively, scoring 19 second-half points en route to a 23-point performance overall.

And more importantly, it was Williams who gave Duke its first lead, 73-72, with 6:51 remaining on his only three-pointer of the game. The Blue Devils relinquished their advantage on two brief occasions on their way to a 95-84 victory.

Erasing a game-high 22-point deficit and an 11-point halftime margin, the entire team displayed a resiliency that has characterized it all season. Boozer effectively neutralized his counterpart Baxter and scored at will in the post. James entered the game and gave the team an emotional spark with hustle plays, big shots and effective rebounding.

As they always do, Battier and Williams showed up at exactly the right time to seal the deal.

"This team has a lot of heart," Krzyzewski said. "It's the youngest team, outside of 'Old Man' [Battier] over here. We're a real young team, so we're prone to getting nervous. But it's the heart of this team, and I think one of the biggest hearts I've ever coached is Jason Williams. He put us on his back for a while there in the second half."

Duke fans in Minneapolis and Durham can only hope that Williams is able to do the same tonight.