True story.
About five minutes before Duke tipped off against Virginia Tech Dec. 3, I had this feeling. Some might call it a premonition. Whatever. Anyway, I turned to my friend and said, "This game is going to be closer than expected and Sean Dockery is going to hit a game-winning shot."
Over two hours later, after the Hokies' Coleman Collins tipped in Zabian Dowdell's missed shot, I was trying to write the beginning of this column in my head.
Should I pretend the Virginia Tech game never happened? Should I call it a bump in the road, a penny on the tracks, a blip on the radar, a slip on the trail to immortality? Should I use some other cliche to explain away Duke's loss?
Or should I tell it like it is-apologize for getting everyone's hopes up and bring The Train to a grinding halt just seven stops into the season? Should I throw everyone off, tell them the show's over, come back next year (maybe)?
Do I write a eulogy for The Train? Oh Train we hardly knew ye, but now you're gone forever? Something like that?
Oh me of little faith.
And ye of little faith, too, if you don't realize the significance of this season's first seven games.
What significance, Alex? The Blue Devils have looked very good at times this season, but they've looked awful at others. Never have they looked like the best team in the country except for five minutes at the beginning of the Indiana game and when they trampled Seton Hall. They only retained their No. 1 ranking this week because their uniforms say "Duke," and no voter in his right mind is going to drop Duke in the rankings after a win.
That's all true. I freely admit it. But I've got three words to share, and, no, I don't think it's too early to break them out.
Team. Of. Destiny.
Great Duke teams find ways to win. It's Blue Devil Magic. The 1992 champions had Hill-to-Laettner. The 1991 champions had Christian Laettner's less-celebrated offensive rebound and two free throws with 12 seconds to play to beat then-undefeated UNLV in the Final Four. The 2001 champions rallied back from big deficits twice to beat an outstanding Maryland team-the second time in the Final Four.
Of course, those victories were against the best teams in the country. It doesn't say much about Duke when it needs a last second 40-foot heave to beat an unranked team that had already lost to Bowling Green this season, does it?
I think it's time for a history lesson. That 2001 championship squad played in the Preseason NIT. In the finals, they barely knocked off Temple, 63-61. The Owls were good, but it's not like they were world-beaters. A week later, Duke beat Temple by 25 in Philadelphia.
After Sunday night's game, Virginia Tech head coach Seth Greenberg was stunned.
"That's not a shot I think anyone expected to go in," he said.
Seth, I predicted it before the game, buddy. I expected it to go in. I knew it was going in.
It's the great truth of Duke Basketball. It's why the Cameron Crazies raise their hands before a three-point shot goes up and not after. It's why the win Sunday night seemed pre-ordained from the moment the ball left Dockery's hands.
The big shot is always, always, always going to fall. It's Duke Magic.
This team-especially Sean Dockery-has the Magic in bunches; its narrow escapes this season demonstrate that much. They have it just like the 1991 team, the 1992 team and the 2001 team. And they're going to ride it all the way to Indianapolis.
But why trust my predictive powers?
I am, after all, just the same guy that wrote in my Nov. 16 column that by the end of the season, "Sean Dockery- [will] have made more big shots than anyone else on the Blue Devil roster."
And all he did was hit Duke's most improbable game-winning shot since Hill-to-Laettner.
Seven down, 32 to go.
Choo, choo, baby. The Train's running on the power of Duke Magic.
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