Congrats to Michigan State and UNC and the rest of the Final Four
I have to hand it to Tom Izzo he stuck to his game plan and it really wore out the Devils..it was an obvious weakness that not many other teams exploited this year. MSU just plain came to play, the Devils were beaten by a better team that night. Nothing else could be said. I made a comment that Duke had more heart than talent and that it would take them only so far. MSU had the bodies and the will to win, they wanted it and they took it, it wasn't handed to them.
Also congrats to Roy Williams and the Tarheels on making it to the Final Four, and by playing good basketball. They have a team that most would envy, good bigs and guard play..great role players, and defenders. They have a legit shot of coming home with a title..there is no easy road though. They have earned it by accepting the style and plan of Roy Williams. I look forward to next year and some great games as well.
I truly can't say this season yielded too much surprise for me. I was surprised, however, that this team did as well as they did on heart alone. Winning the ACC tournament and gaining a number one seed in the NCAA tourney was something that very few thought possible for this team--me included. Without the services of Luol Deng, Shaun Livingston, Chris Duhon--and don't forget the transer of Michael Thompson, and Chris Humphries. This could have easily spelled disaster for this or any other teams..but they never let others define their success, they ran their own race with one thing in mind, get better each practice...and that they did.
This team provided Coach K and his staff plenty of examples of heart. J.J. Redick had an outstanding year, was 2nd in voting for college player of the year and was ACC player of the year..no one can take that away from him.
Shelden Williams often had to carry this team on his back on the nights that J.J. couldn't, he has steadily improved his game and his skill set each year in this system. If SheWIll should decide that 3 years is enough for him and he wants to test those NBA waters, who could blame him. I certainly wouldn't think any less of him. Although I would be tempted to stay on a team that is battle tested and will definitely have the talent and depth to make a deep run next year. For one thing a true point guard is heading to Durham, something that has been missing for a while now.
Daniel Ewing, the Silent Assassin, while not having his best year has definitely showed the country his versatility..sure his shooting suffered this year, but he assist numbers went up and he showed that he could make the transition to point guard from just a shooter. He did this selflessly and I hope he is rewarded for this in the league. He was the anchor to this team and was always ok with deferring to J.J. when I know he wanted to take that big shot. These are qualities that make a good basketball player and a good team player. He is one of those 4 year guys you never forget. Congrats on an outstanding year.
I as a fanatic have my own ideas for success for the team I pull for, this years team definitely surpassed that...and I am proud to be a Duke Fan.
Some exciting things on the horizon for the DukeBlog is that I am moving this blog to a private server where I will have much more control over the design and content, I plan to focus hard between now and next year on recruiting and the new players coming in next year. So hopefully those of you who actually come to this blog will come to the next step in its evolution at:
http://www.dukeblogger.com. I am hoping to have it up and running sometime this week. Thanks for all the posts and comments.
