January 4th seems too far away. I can't remember our guys ever being off this long.
Agreed. For fun, if you were Coach K, what would you have the team work on most during the break?
They've not had a break this long in the last ten years at least. I checked that online at goduke.com. I was going to check back further, but the archive records aren't available there anymore because they were outsourced to some place called lsiconsulting.com and the links don't work.
Ding ding ding!!! That's been my thought since for a while. RJ has his supporters, including K, and at times he does in fact do amazing things, but his efficiency is not very good, and if he becomes better aware of how to involve his highly talented teammates, such as Zion, then this team will get even better.
Yeah, FTs are something they don't need team time to practice, but the drive n kick passing is certainly something i hope the coaching staff really hones in on, and maybe even coming up with innovative ways for this particular group to utilize that better.
My worry is that Duke's 2+ weeks off will cause at least the 1st half to be really rusty, hopefully not sloppy. Clemson otoh, will have have played less than a week prior and will have less rust. I'm sensing that Duke will probably play Clemson +/- even in the 1st half, but it's the 2nd half that will determine the victor, and i think Duke's talent and depth will wear the Tiggers down.
Last edited by DukieInBrasil; 12-31-2018 at 12:41 PM.
Duke played Michigan on December 14, 1991 and didn't play again until December 30, against William and Mary. That's the longest gap I can come up with until this year.
The Michigan game was an overtime win at Ann Arbor over the Fab Five.
A very key game in the whole story of the Fab Five and Duke's dynasty IMO...Fab 5 played great, pushed Duke to the end, and the Michigan crowd was nuts...great win. So to beat them on their home court, then slap them silly in the NCAAT title game later that season was suh-weet.
We are still scheduled to play the maximum number of non-post-season games permitted this season (as we do every year). I agree that it doesn't feel like it.
Last season, we played our 12th game on Dec. 9; whereas, this year we played our 12th game on Dec. 20. The post-season tournaments are a week later (the NCAA finals are on April 8!), so we are a week (2 games) behind the dates of last season's games.
"I don't like them when they are eating my azaleas or rhododendrons or pansies." - Coach K
Likely due to the fact that Thanksgiving formerly marked the "pre-season" tournament period (Great Alaska Shootout, Maui Invitational, and a few others). Now, we start weeks earlier and there's only so many games you can play.
Also, it's ESPN bowl season so they aren't pushing for the extra games now either.