Just a reminder ... there are a little less than 2,000 tickets remaining for the NCAA Basketball Tournament second and third rounds at the Greensboro Coliseum.

We've made this plea before, but it's imperative that as many Duke fans as possible buy tickets -- NOW! Nothing is guaranteed, but there's a 90-plus percent chance that both Duke and UNC will be sent to pods in Greensboro. It's important that we have enough Duke fans in the house to counterbalance the UNC fans who will stay to cheer for Duke's opponent.

This really hurt us in 2005 in Charlotte, but that was an odd situation. UNC was projected to go to Charlotte all season long, along with Wake Forest. Only Wake's late collapse allowed Duke to steal the Charlotte site. But it wasn't much of a prize. There were almost no tickets available and it turned into a very hostile venue.

We had much better luck in 2009 in Greensboro and 2011 in Charlotte, where we shared the arena with UNC, but had few problems because our fans bought up as many tickets as the UNC people.

It's worth the small gamble that Duke will slump enough to lose the right to play in Greensboro (it would take NC State or maybe Virginia finishing with a higher seed). Even if the unthinkable happens and you get stuck with tickets, the odds are very good that UNC or State will be there and you'll be able to sell your tickets (and maybe make a profit).

There's no telling where Duke might end up for the regionals, but it's very VERY likely that they start in Greensboro. For ticket info, you can try stubhub or the Greensboro Coliseum sire or the NCAA site:

http://www.ncaa.com/news/basketball-...et-information

Just a plea to prevent the light blue crowd from buying up all the tickets.