Christmas came 23 days early for Duke fans this year.
While they were beating Georgetown Dec. 2, the Blue Devils were handing out gifts.
(Yes, I know this is my second "holiday gimmick" column in three weeks. But hey, it's the holiday season. And I know you'd rather see this than The Train II.)
Even Coach K got into the giving mood. I don't know if I've ever seen Krzyzewski get as pumped for a non-conference win as he did at the end of that game. He seems re-invigorated this year-maybe because he gets to trumpet his team's abilities instead of playing them down, like he had to do last year. After the Georgetown game, he flat-out said, "I really love my team."
As the game ended, he was waving his hands and pumping up the crowd-if I hadn't known better, I would've thought Lee Melchionni kidnapped his old coach, put on a Coach K mask and started working the sidelines.
Speaking of Melchionni, some of you may have been missing his trademark hustle and fist-pumping ability. If you did, Marty Pocius has a gift for you. Against Georgetown, he looked like Lee 2.0. He came off the bench when Duke was struggling to score in the first half and knocked down two open three-pointers. That was basically the Melchionni Special.
He even punctuated the second trey with a huge fist pump that, honestly, put even Melchionni's best celebrations to shame. On the defensive end, he flexed his muscles and dove all over the floor. Some devotees of the Church of Lee-Lee-Lee might think this is blasphemous, but Pocius has the potential to be a better goofy celebrator than Melchionni himself was. I know I'll be watching this closely as the season continues.
(And don't try to tell me that Pocius is a better dunker than Melchionni. I won't argue this point.)
At the very least, a gaping hole in Duke's emotional lineup seems to have been filled. DeMarcus Nelson has settled into the Daniel Ewing-esque role of talented, athletic and reliable guard that everyone seems to forget about, and Brian Zoubek is doing a great job at "Big Guy on the Bench Who Waves His Arms and Always Looks Really Excited." Zoubek has a ways to go, however, before he becomes Nick Horvath's equal in that regard. (Though, to be fair, Horvath spent five years developing into the role, and Zoubek has only been a Blue Devil for eight games.)
Now they just need to find "The White Guy Opposing Fans Love to Hate" (in the tradition of Christian Laettner and J.J. Redick). The way Greg Paulus played against Georgetown, he just may be the winner.
But the best gift was the demise of those hideous new jerseys. Some of the less sartorially-minded among you might not have noticed the little stripes that came off Duke's collars at a 45 degree angle for the first part of this season. Some of you might not have cared.
But against Georgetown, the stripes were gone, and the jerseys looked like last year's model. It was the captains' choice which jerseys the team would wear, and apparently they were tired of the stupid stripes.
For the first half, I was worried Duke would lose, and they would decide the stripe-less model was bad luck. Honestly, I think the Blue Devils might have played just a little bit harder because they didn't want to wear those jerseys anymore. Maybe that's why Coach K was so excited that they won.
Finally, the last gift doesn't really have anything to do with the Georgetown game. Instead, it's a gift from me to you.
Just imagine you could watch a highlight video of current assistant coach Chris Collins from when he was a senior in high school. Now imagine the video features Collins and his basketball teammates dancing to the MC Hammer song "2 Legit 2 Quit." Now imagine that they make the "2 Legit 2 Quit" hand motions, moonwalk and do this weird dance where they twitch their "behinds" and look kind of like they're ice-skating.
If I told you this video actually existed, is that something you might be interested in? Would you say that you'd immediately stop what you're doing to watch this video?
Then stop what you're doing, go to YouTube.com and search for "GBN Chris Collins." The video is the only result. Do it right now and you can thank me later.
Happy Chrismahanakwanzah.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.