After being very ill for over a week and taking care of my wife who has also been ill. I stopped by DBR to check all the postings, especially after last nights Duke game and UNC's game against Clemson. After adding 2 and 2 and 2 together I have come to figure out something about those of us who call ourselves Duke fans. As near as I can tell there are 3 types of Duke fans.
1.Students / alums.
2. Fans that want Duke to succeed above all else
3.Duke fans who want UNC to fail more than anything else.
This was very apparent in the UNC recruiting post that got closed. Slightly apparent in the Duke game thread from last night. And very apparent again in the Clemson Has A Chance thread.
The way I see it a person attending Duke or that graduated from there has the school spirit, proud alum rah, rah thing going. Duke IS such a great school that optimism about all aspects of Duke are going to shine through 99 times out of 100. The second category is a little skewed because if Duke succeeds, ultimately UNC is going to fail. (There are no co-national champions...at least in basketball!) But many people that fall into this second category want Duke teams to do their best and pay little or no attention to what any other schools accomplish.
Then you have the ABC crowd. Some are converted NCSU fans (and other former fans) that hate UNC. Some are Duke fans from childhood that remember when UNC owned college basketball in NC. Some are just people who want to hurl every time they hear a UNC fan / alum spew light blue garbage from their mouth, tee shirt and car bumper. Granted we all want to beat UNC more than any team each year in every sport. But some of us view the whole thing as a good vs. evil, force vs. dark force, JR Ewing vs Bobby Ewing thing. I think that's really important to look at when a fan is stating / posting their opinion. 99.9% of fans in the country would be satisfied with the season Duke is having, the last ten seasons they have had and most of all the prospects for the next four years. I can Guarantee UCLA fans don't stress over UNC getting three recruits in the boat. And aside from true Duke haters out there most will only see the score of last nights Duke game and see who won.
It's really not fair to the players, staff and prospects for some of us ABCers (Yes I'm one of the third type.) to have the mindset we do. Heck it's not even fair to all of us Duke fans in general when some of us think we have to live up and surpass what they do in Chapel Hill. (There are a ton of UNC and MD fans who think the same way about Duke.) But the rivalry is older than anyone reading this and it runs deeper than the number of miles between the two campuses. Any kid inking with either school should know a spotlight is going to be on them not just from their fans but the fans of their arch enemy. I really didn't agree with the UNC Recruit post being closed, but I understand why. Under 99 spotlights the past and future gleam bright for Duke University (From last nights game it's apparent Duke needs some more Rhodes Scholars and Nobel prize winners!) and Duke athletics. But to those of us looking at things from under that one ugly spotlight in a light blue shade we want more even though we should be happy with what we have.