Willie Warren on Duke- Sentiments about Duke Title Shot

[Devils Rock]

I suspect the previous poster was referring to the 2004-2005 and 2005-2006 seasons. The 2004 final four team was not a "JJ and Shel team," and in fact was clearly led by Chris Duhon with a significant contribution from Luol Deng both absent from the subsequent two years.

Yes, I was referring to 3 of JJ's years on campus. We had a pretty balanced team his sophomore year and I think that made a big difference. Although even that team struggled when JJ had his off night in the tournament. This follows my earlier post in that I think it is always dangerous to put too many eggs in one basket, whether it be one player or a reliance on the three or whatever. Most of the great teams that I can remember had no glaring weaknesses and generally were solid in most aspects of the game. All of the really great Duke teams that I can recall from the K era followed this model: even if they were a great 3 shooting team they wouldn't overly rely on it or even if they had a great player at one position, they wouldn't lean on that player for all of the production night in and night out.

[ncexnyc]

I really find it hard to believe that people actually think that what has transpired in previous seasons doesn't have some effect on this current team.

This isn't a new team. Only Elliot, Miles, and Olek are freshman, everyone else knows what it's like to get bounced early from the tournament. Greg has experienced 3 straight years of major disappointment. It's called having the monkey on your back and you can talk about it not having any effect on you all you want, but it's definitely in the back of every players mind.

I'm sure the kids at Clemson can tell you all about this and in their case it isn't a monkey, but rather an 800 pound gorilla dressed in Carolina Blue.