Late Saturday night, a great tragedy befell one of our dearest friends. While many of us were off dancing the night away with President Brodhead and that strangely '70s cover band at the Homecoming Dance, Duke Basketball died peacefully in his sleep.
He was 102 years old.
The immediate cause of his death was from a condition known as SLBJ (Sudden Loss of Basketball Jesus). Duke's would-be program savior, Greg Monroe, verbally committed to Georgetown Saturday night.
For those unaware of Duke's not-so-secret love affair with the 6-foot-10, 226-pound Basketball Adonis out of Harvey, La., Monroe was widely regarded as the nation's top high school senior. The loss of Monroe at this juncture has quite possibly been the most devastating disaster out of Louisiana since the New Orleans Saints' disappointing 0-4 start to this season. (What? I couldn't think of any other recent Louisiana disasters.)
The powerfully built forward was athletic, an excellent passer and left-handed. Greg Monroe was basically the second-coming of Josh McRoberts. So let's face it, Greg Monroe was the first-coming of Josh McRoberts.
SLBJ, while debilitating, is not always fatal. Duke's long-time rival and neighbor Carolina suffered from SLBJ last year with the loss of big-time recruit Kevin Love to UCLA. But by treating Monroe as his primary and pretty much only big man recruit for next year's freshman class, Duke endangered his already troublesome frontcourt. Before his death, friends commented that Duke looked increasingly less like himself and more like the team from "Hoosiers."
But we shouldn't blame the death of our friend on Greg Monroe. Duke Basketball was already engaging in a series of reckless behaviors that led to his untimely death Saturday. The first was the move away from quality big men. Duke has and probably would have always been a guard-oriented team. And that's fine. It's more up-tempo, high-scoring and fun to watch despite the fact that last season's guard-dominant team set offensive basketball back to the pre-shot clock days.
But championship caliber teams need at least one big guy to match up on defense and keep opposing teams from overplaying the guards. In recent years, Duke's apparent vision problem has led to his mistaking large, athletic centers for small, shrimpy white dudes. That makes about as much sense as anointing a former point guard as the big man coach. (At least Lance is extremely skilled at slapping the floor.)
Duke's friends will also recall his arrogance as a contributing factor to his death. Duke would often assume he could continue to recruit the nation's top players without fanfare or pageantry. Up until his death, Duke stubbornly refused to engage in a practice known as Midnight Madness on the first night of NCAA-sanctioned practices. While many of his colleagues including Kentucky, Carolina and (what was that school called...) Georgetown held Midnight Madness this weekend, Duke apparently ran three-man weaves and lay-up drills.
And while Monroe was scheduled to visit Duke during the annual Blue-White Scrimmage, somehow I doubt there's anything the watered-down Crazies section could have done to compete with the entire Georgetown basketball team crankin' dat Soulja Boy with NFL Hall-of-Famer Jerry Rice at the helm while the raucous Hoya crowd chanted his name. But who knows? Maybe we could have thrown in a really solid "Let's Go Duke!"
I know for many of us it will be hard to believe that Duke really gone. It seems like just yesterday we watched him win an astounding four of his last 12 games and almost upset Virginia Commonwealth in the NCAA Tournament. But I gained acceptance this weekend when during our annual football pummeling at the hands of Virginia Tech, I couldn't confidently retort, "We'll get you during basketball season."
But when we remember our friend, we should be thankful of the good times-the three National Championships, the many Final Four appearances and Gerald Henderson's elbow to Tyler Hansbrough's face.
Duke Basketball is survived by his 13 children, his father Mike Krzyzewksi and 6,000 angry fans, most notable of which includes the Class of 2008. It will become only the second class since 1985 to never witness a Final Four appearance.
An ongoing memorial service will be held from November until March and will be called the 2007-2008 Duke Basketball season.
ZACH BRAFF and Brandon Curl are canceling their subscriptions to Rivals.com.
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