Maryland-Duke: March Madness Comes Early

Feb. 11 has turned out to be an important date for both the Duke and Maryland basketball teams. Both turned their seasons around.

Duke went into College Park that day emotionally drained. The Blue Devils had lost three straight tough games by a total of just nine points.

Maryland, on the other hand, had totally underachieved. The Terps came into that date with the Devils at just 3-6 in the ACC and 17-7 overall. It looked like Maryland might miss the NCAA tournament for a third straight year. Gary Williams was being questioned.

But for once Duke wasn’t ready to play, and Maryland just drilled them. Beat the heck out of Duke 72-60. The Devils were not ready for what the Terps brought.

“I think we played really young,” freshman Jon Scheyer says, reflecting on that dismal Sunday. ”I think that was a big turning point for us.”

Duke had lost four straight, and there was the unheard of talk that Duke could miss the NCAA tournament.

Mike Krzyzewski would have none of this. He knew his young team needed leadership—emotional leadership—and the 60-year-old coach decided he’d provide that.

Coach K and his staff became more vocal, more demonstrative, and it had an effect. Kryzewski became Duke’s vocal leader.

“We’ve taken our coach’s lead,” says Scheyer. “For as old as he is, to be running up and down and jumping, that’s great. It gives us excitement and gets me up to another notch.”

Now later, Scheyer with a smile says he didn’t mean to call his hall of fame coach "old," but you get the picture. Mike Krzyzewski knew this young team needed something, and he was going to give them all he had, just like he wanted them to do for him.

“Coach has been trying to get us to his level as far as intensity," junior tri-captain DeMarcus Nelson says. “Coach demands a lot of us.”

So Duke goes into Wednesday’s game with Maryland on a four-game winning streak, they’re playing with intensity and their confidence appears restored. They’re playing what they call Duke basketball.

“We have confidence in ourselves first of all,” says Nelson. “And we have confidence in each other.”

Nelson said Duke never lost belief during that losing streak. He said that it wasn’t like they were getting blown out. He said their confidence was always there, but the losing streak did bring them together.

“It was a matter of us coming closer together as a team and figuring out how to win.”

And that they have. There’s no more talk about Duke not making the tournament. The Devils are in, though high-flying Maryland coming to Cameron will be a test to see just how much they’ve improved. Duke is looking forward to that.

“Right now we’re in a good spot and we’re progressing,” Nelson says. “We’re very close to being as a team where we want to be.”

While the loss may have turned it around for Duke, the win did the exact same thing for Maryland.

That domination of Duke on the 11th started the Terps on a five-game win streak that was capped last Sunday with the stunning comeback win over North Carolina.

So both teams will enter the game at 22-7 overall and 8-6 in the ACC and like Duke, the Terps will be in the NCAA tournament. Both have a shot to move into the top four in the conference.

One thing you can usually say about Duke is that they will come out ready to play and the other has to match that intensity. That was not the case in the first meeting. Duke couldn’t match Maryland’s energy and passion. Nelson called it Duke’s worst game of the season.

Maryland is athletic, more so than Duke, and they will want an up-tempo game. They have the ability to pound Duke on the glass. They Devils can’t let that happen, and they can’t let the Maryland press bother them. The Terps want a hare's pace.

Scheyer says that's OK.

“If they’re gonna press us, we should be excited about that, because it gives us good opportunities to score, and if we get open looks and lay-ups it will take them out of it."

Will Maryland have a letdown after the upset of Carolina? I would think not because Gary Williams has always had this thing with Duke. He’d rather beat them than anybody and his players know it.;

I think Maryland may be better than Duke. That and a dollar will get you a nice bottled water.

This game will be played with the energy of a tournament game. These teams will play this one like it’s lose-and-go-home. Nobody will mail this one in.

Duke is maturing as a team, but that maturity hasn’t reached the level yet that they won’t look to the bench for emotion.

“Follow our coaches' lead as far as their intensity and passion for the game," says Nelson. “If we follow their lead, we’ll win this game and win it big.”

We’ll see.

March madness comes a day early.