Nolan Smith Deserves Place in Duke History

If you hate Duke, and there are certainly a lot of you who do, listen up to what I’m about to say.  If your go-to moves to get under the skin of Duke fans include calling Coach K “Rat-face”, or taking shots at the social awkwardness of the Cameron Crazies, or even calling Duke’s players “Uncle Toms”, you’re going about it all wrong.  If you REALLY want to drive a knife into the heart of a Duke fan, if you REALLY want to see that look in their eyes like you’d see when a “your momma” joke goes way too far, I’d encourage you to mention one of three things … the tragic endings to Jason Williams’ and Bobby Hurley’s professional careers, the name “Mike Nifong”, or the 2004 NCAA Semifinals against UCONN.  That night in San Antonio is the night when the haters started winning.  And it could have been the end of the Duke basketball program as we know it.

When the dust cleared from that installment of the painful rivalry between Duke and UCONN, the Devils simply couldn’t overcome controversial foul trouble, a few key no-calls late in the game, and a great performance by Ameka Okafor.  While painful, the future still seemed bright for the Blue Devils.  After all, freshman Luol Deng was the team’s most talented player, and sophomore sharpshooter JJ Redick was well on his way to the ACC career scoring record at the end of his 2nd season.  Down low, Duke had Shelden Williams and Shavlik Randolph returning, and Daniel Ewing was poised to take over as the leader of the team during his upcoming senior season.  Not to mention 6’7” phenom Shaun Livingston on the way to Durham to run the show.  However, Livingston never made it to Duke, and Deng also declared for the NBA draft, which was a huge blow to Duke’s title chances.  Even so, the next season started off like so many others for Duke, starting off 15-0 and climbing to #2 in the polls.  Duke won the ACC championship that season, but fell in the Sweet 16 to Michigan State.  At the time, the loss seemed to be a minor bump in the road when, in hindsight, it actually gave a glimpse into Duke’s best not being good enough.  

Things still looked up for the optimistic Duke fans as Blue Devil nation sat on the edge of their seats awaiting the freshman class coming in the next season … Eric Boateng, Jamal Boykin, Martynas Pocius, Greg Paulus and Josh McRoberts.  This was to be the class to bring Duke back to the days of Alarie, Bilas, Henderson and Dawkins, and Brand, Boozer, Burgess, Battier and Avery.  Duke was back.  In reality, nothing could be farther from the truth.  Boateng and Boykin would end up transferring.  Pocius could never find his way into the lineup because he was a defensive liability and arguably served as a scape-goat for Mike Krzyzewski, McRoberts never panned out to his billing as the next Christian Laettner, and Greg Paulus became the poster boy for Duke hate across the globe.  On top of the disappointing returns from that recruiting class, Shavlik Randolph declared for the NBA draft at the end of the 2004-05 season, leaving Duke on the short-end of a heated recruiting battle with rival UNC with nothing to show for it.  Still, the 2005-06 team won 32 games and an ACC championship.  But another Sweet 16 loss had the rumbles of Duke’s demise growing louder and more believable.  A 2006-07 campaign saw just 22 wins for the Blue Devils, the least number of wins since 1995-96, the year after Coach K’s leave of absence.  Duke lost in the first round that year on a last-second shot by VCU, a loss that was absolutely devastating at the time even as the Rams prepare for their trip to this year’s Final Four.  That March, the haters were at their loudest, and as ESPN analyst Doug Gottleib wondered aloud, “Is Duke even relevant anymore?”, there was not much evidence to dispute him, and there was no one there who stood determined to prove him wrong.  Before, Duke was hated because Duke won a lot of basketball games.  Now, the Duke hatred had become personal.

In the spring of 1990, I walked out of the doors to the Bryan Center on Duke’s campus after spending my allowance on more Duke Final Four gear, which was an annual ritual during that time.  In the distance I could hear bass from a car stereo getting louder as it approached, and as it turned into the Bryan Center parking lot, Ice Cube’s “Nigga You Love to Hate” was blasting loud through the open car windows.  The car pulled into circle at the end of the parking lot, the one marked with “no parking” signs posted every three feet, and stopped and parked just a few feet from the front door.  Christian Laettner climbed out of the drivers’ seat and walked past me singing the chorus under his breath, “Fuck you, Ice Cube”.  To this day, I fully believe that Ice Cube wrote that song about a 6’11” white boy from Angola, New York.

There was plenty of Duke hate back then as well.  To say that Christian Laettner ignored it would be lying.  Laettner lived for it.  When someone has an irrational hatred of you, it’s a natural reaction for you to want them to like you.  Not him.  He wanted you to hate him even more.  That kind of attitude is all well and good when you’re as successful as Laettner and his Duke teams were.  Bringing it back to more recent history, that kind of pressure can crumble a program when you’re running out guys like Greg Paulus and Lee Melchionni to fight the good fight.  In this case, the fight wasn’t with the media or opposing fans, the hate was trickling down to high school recruits, the life-blood of any program.  Laettner is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of player.  I’ve never encountered anyone who is wired quite like him to handle hatred, and as a Duke fan, I watched recruit after recruit choose to shy away from the pressure-cooker that is Duke basketball.  It’s one thing to be booed when walking into an opposing team’s gym, but it’s quite another to be clowned amongst your peers for being a “Duke guy”.  Even today, when you hear that term “Duke guy” you close your eyes and picture Wojo, Battier, Paulus, Scheyer … the guys you’re so sick of hearing about how hard they work and how heady they are.  They didn’t have to work hard, they were spoon-fed everything they ever accomplished.  They don’t know pain and adversity … that’s what the haters say.  But Nolan Smith, well, he’s a different story entirely.

Changing the perception of Duke’s basketball program is no small task.  In fact, the general public’s hatred of Duke basketball has become so entrenched in the culture of college basketball that there is an entire generation of Duke haters who don’t even know why they hate Duke in the first place.  We live in a society that encourages us to pick sides on nearly every front, and when it comes to college basketball, no one is siding with Duke unless they have a good reason to. 

Nolan came to Duke as a well-liked and highly-respected member of the basketball community.  His infectious personality, his big heart, and his exceptional talent made him a favorite throughout the “DMV” basketball hot-bed.  His first task towards addressing Duke’s perception wasn’t to win over opposing players and fans, it was to win over the Duke fans who had grown restless waiting for the next Laettner to come along and fight the hate, not just with attitude like Redick or Duhon, but with wins and championships.  From the start, Nolan began on a team that likely could be the most hated team in Duke history, a feat made possible by the entry of self-hate from Duke fans that’s usually only reserved to our neighbors from Raleigh.  The 2007-08 Duke team featured a lone senior, DeMarcus Nelson, a limited floor general in Junior Greg Paulus, and a sophomore Jon Scheyer who was dealing with the unfair billing of the second-coming of JJ Redick.  Gerald Henderson was a world-class talent who had not yet broken out of his shell, and fellow freshman Kyle Singler was a highly regarded talent, but the fanbase had grown too weary of unfulfilled promises from the past few recruiting classes to get too excited about an incoming freshman.  To make matters worse, rival UNC was poised to make another title run just two years removed from their last NCAA crown.  In summary, there was a very small margin for error in Durham, and not much light at the end of the tunnel to match the elite level guard play being displayed down the road in Chapel Hill.  Once again, though that team rose to as high as #2 in the polls, it failed to win 30 games, failed to win an ACC championship, and barely snuck past Belmont in the 1st round of the ACC tournament before getting pounded into submission by West Virginia.  Following that 73-67 loss which was much less of a game than the final score indicated, West Virginia players had their way with Duke’s players in the post-game press conference as the media laughed hysterically …

“We knew that coming in that they were just going to stand around and not rebound. So we were ready to exploit that,” exclaimed West Virginia’s Joe Alexander.  “We don’t care that they’re Duke. That doesn’t mean anything to us.”

Further, when he was asked to comment on Duke’s 8 McDonald’s All-Americans, Alexander laughed, “Who?”  Teammate Cam Thoroughman then asked if Greg Paulus was one of the eight.  When told yes, Thoroughman said, “Oh my God. Are you kidding?”

It was the ultimate insult added to injury. 

The next season was a slight improvement from the previous one.  Duke returned to #1 in the polls mid-season, and won 30 games and an ACC Championship.  However, the ‘live-by-the-three’ meme reared its ugly head once again as cold-shooting Duke was bounced out of the Sweet 16 in a blowout loss to Villanova.  The fans’ take on Duke that season was a ‘good riddance’ to Greg Paulus who had proven an inability to stay in front of the opposing guard and an inability to get into the lane himself.  It had become clear, if Duke was ever going to return to form, a dynamic guard was needed.  Duke’s best athletes parted ways with the Blue Devils as Gerald Henderson entered the draft and Elliot Williams transferred to Memphis, and no backcourt help was on the way as the lone signee was post-player Mason Plumlee.  Frustrated and unsure of his role in the program, and frustrated by the loss of his mentor Johnny Dawkins who headed out west to Stanford, Nolan Smith considered transferring as well.  Instead, Nolan made a decision to go “all in” with the Blue Devils, and as well-hidden of a decision as it was at the time, it’s hard not to wonder if this decision forever regained the momentum of Duke’s basketball program.

“Allow me to reintroduce myself …”  Jay-Z’s ‘Public Service Announcement’ not only indicated the arrival of the new Nolan Smith, it marked the rebirth of Duke Basketball as something to be excited about for Duke fans.  The stripped-down, low-fi approach that matched Coach K’s no-nonsense style of coaching fit so well for so many successful years, but it was time for a change.  On that night in November of 2009, Duke fans got to see the other side of Duke basketball.  The fun, enthusiastic, light-hearted side that anyone who’s ever spent time with the snarky, sarcastic Coach K away from the court knew had to be in there somewhere was displayed to the public for the first time ever, and no one knew how to react.  The media and Duke fans alike were literally at a loss for words when trying to describe the Titanic parody featuring Nolan Smith and Andre Dawkins.  Duke having fun?  Unheard of.  This side of Duke basketball continued throughout the season as Nolan became the primary host of www.dukeblueplanet.com features.  On the court, he worked as hard as anyone in the nation, and he increased his scoring average from 8.4 points per game to 17.4 points per game.  But he did it with a smile on his face, and was at his best when he was playing like a little kid thrilled to be on such a big stage rather than as a gritty bundle of hustle ready for a fight at any time like his Duke predecessors.  He opened himself up to fans through Twitter and grew his popularity thousands of followers at a time.  In the process, he won over Duke fans again.  Nolan was “our guy”, or “The People’s Champion” as we dubbed him in our www.ndotsmittypoy.com campaign.  Nolan made Duke look cool again, which was a task that seemed impossible during the Redick/Paulus years.

I’ll go ahead and say it … without Nolan Smith at Duke, Andre Dawkins isn’t a Blue Devil.  Seth Curry isn’t a Blue Devil.  Kyrie Irving isn’t a Blue Devil.  Quinn Cook isn’t a Blue Devil, and neither is Alex Murphy or Rasheed Suliamon down the road.  Duke doesn’t get in the mix for Shabazz Mohammed or Tony Parker.  Duke isn’t on ESPN All-Access.  Jon Scheyer, Brian Zoubek and Lance Thomas don’t have championship rings.  Kyle Singler is playing in the NBA this year.  Coach K is five steps closer to retiring.  Without Nolan Smith, the last four seasons would have been miserable for Duke fans.  And more depressingly, the next four would be just as miserable as the four before.  Duke will always have haters.  It’s the nature of the beast of being a successful basketball program at a private university.  I’m talking to you, Butler.  Enjoy it now, we know how the second act plays out for you and for Brad Stevens.  Duke hate will never go away, Nolan was never going to be able to change that.

But here’s what he did accomplish … Nolan Smith brought love back to Durham.  Jalen Rose was spot on when he said Duke recruits a certain kind of player.  But that player doesn’t look like you think he does, Jalen.  The new Duke player loves when fans come up to him and ask for a picture or an autograph.  The new Duke player isn’t feared, he’s well-liked and respected.  People aren’t jealous of the new Duke player, and people don’t scoff at any positive mention of him in the media.  People now say things like “I don’t cheer for Duke, but I’ll cheer for him.”  Though Nolan’s played his last game in a Duke uniform, this is the beginning of the Nolan Smith era of Duke basketball. 

There will be ups and downs, just like always.  There will be more banners, and there will be more Sweet 16 exits.  But as long as there are more Nolan Smiths on the way, the good times will far outweigh the bad.  It’s not hard to see a lot of Nolan in Duke’s next two guards, Quinn Cook and Rasheed Suliamon.  Not necessarily in the way they play, but in the way they carry themselves.  That’s a tremendously positive sign for Duke fans and a troubling sign for Duke haters.  There will continue to be that player who two that boils the blood of opposing fans; look no farther than Austin Rivers next season.  But it’s clear to me that K’s staff has seen the value of people like Nolan Smith, and that type of character and personality is becoming a requirement for Duke targets.  While it’s exciting to see the impact he’s had on the criteria our coaches use to identify future Blue Devils, there will never be another player who will be as much of a program-changer as Nolan Smith. 

And I, for one, hope there will never be another player who wears #2.

What Happened? Duke’s Season Ends Suddenly

Eyes will tell you all you need to know.  If you’re one who pays attention to the details of Coach K’s philosophy on communication, you already know his thoughts on how important the eyes are in telling a story.  Words are only a fraction of what makes up communication, but a person’s eyes can you tell you all you’d ever need to know about someone in one brief moment.  As the horn blew at the scorer’s table and Kyle and Nolan dropped their heads and slinked their way off of the court for the last time in a Duke uniform, I was screaming at the TV as the producers panned from Arizona fans celebrating in the crowd to Sean Miller trying to keep his team calm and then to Arizona players high fiving and chest bumping.  I needed to see them leave the court.  I wanted to see their eyes.  Selfishly, I needed some closure to this debacle of a season finale.  I got a brief glimpse of Coach K talking to his two seniors on the sidelines, but I couldn’t tell anything from that other than that none of the three seemed to know what to do or say.  Then another reaction shot from the court, and then finally … Nolan on the bench, looking out on the court, I saw his eyes.  There were a few tears, but nothing as memorably emotional as Chris Carrawell coming off of the court and draping himself on his coaches in exhaustion and in the bitter realization that he gave his best, but his best wasn’t quite good enough to win.  I didn’t expect Nolan to cry because he knows real loss and real pain, and this is just a basketball game.  But I did expect an answer.  I wanted to know what happened.  I wanted to know why the season was ending, why were we getting destroyed by Arizona, what the hell happened.  Nolan’s eyes told me that he was wondering the exact same thing.  I don’t think anyone knew what happened.  There’s only one thing we know for sure at this point … this season is over.

First, let’s start with the game itself.  The 2nd half that Arizona put together is the best half of basketball I’ve seen since UNLV ran Duke out of the gym in 1990.  I’m confident in saying there is not one team in America that would have beaten Arizona last night.  Sure, Duke’s defense contributed to the offensive performance of the Wildcats, but their offense made Duke’s defense take on uncomfortable challenges.  Classic man-to-man defense says to stay low, slightly off of one shoulder, and an arm’s length away from the player with the ball.  The way Arizona hit contested jump shots forced Duke’s defenders to defend too closely which led to blow-by opportunities for Arizona guards.  And when I say Arizona guards, I mean everyone on the court.  Help-side defense had to rotate over from such a great distance that it would leave a player open for a wide open three.  Usually you can hope a team misses enough of those looks to stay in the game, but Arizona was not missing anything.  You can blame slow feet or you can blame a lack of conditioning from Kyrie Irving as a culprit, but for anyone who has ever competed against a team who can do no wrong, it messes with your head to the point where your body doesn’t respond like it normally does.  My advice – do not waste a single minute breaking down the game film.  All you’d see would be a lot of uncharacteristic mistakes being caused by doubt, frustration, anxiety and exhaustion.  A bunch of guys, normally unflappable, looking around wondering what the hell happened.

And cut with the chemistry talk.  There was no chemistry issue against Hampton, there was no chemistry issue against Michigan.  Additionally, there was no chemistry issue against Arizona.  Putting blame on Kyrie’s return is just a contrived conclusion found while aimlessly seeking for an answer as to why we lost.  Nolan Smith had a bad game.  Nolan Smith hasn’t had a bad game in a really long time.  Kyrie Irving hasn’t played extended minutes for a really long time.  So by that, I concluded that Kyrie Irving playing extended minutes caused Nolan Smith to have a bad game.  Nolan had a bad game because he’s human.  It happens.  Just a few short months ago, I celebrated my San Francisco Giants destroying four of the most dominant starting pitchers in all of baseball.  Tom Brady didn’t win the Super Bowl.  Tiger Woods hasn’t won a major since 2008.  Sometimes the best athletes have bad performances.  So why are we so quick to blame this on Kyrie’s return?  Because Nolan Smith is one of the most beloved Duke players ever, and he laid an absolute egg in his last game ever as a Blue Devil.  Did Duke lose because of Nolan?  No, that’s not at all what I’m saying.  But Nolan had an awful game at the worst of times, and it was a direct result of nothing more than being mortal.  Don’t fall into the trap of somehow trying to use this Duke loss to undermine Coach K’s ability to lead championship teams, because that’s what “they’re” doing to you, Duke fans.  Within minutes of the final horn, I saw two memes spreading around Twitter … K’s declining success rate in the Sweet 16 round, and Kyrie’s impact on team chemistry and Nolan’s role.  I’m begging you, Duke fans, take a step back and see how transparent that is.  Nolan, and likely Kyrie, are gone after this year.  So let’s place the blame on the guy who will be at Duke for years to come and try to chip away at the respect and adoration Coach K’s players and fans have for him.  That’s not working on me, I’m sorry.  Nolan Smith, our leader, our player of the year candidate, one of my favorite players of all-time, played an extremely bad basketball game.  And it makes me feel for him even more.

It’s fitting that the team poster this year featured the motto “One”.  Thought it was used to demonstrate the bond between the players, this season will forever be remembered as Kyrie’s year.  Over the first 8 games, he electrified us with every aspect of his game.  After being stolen away from college basketball by a freak toe injury against Butler in early December, Duke fans followed along with one of the most frustrating rehab efforts in sports history.  Meanwhile, the team rolled on to a 21-4 record without him, and even while celebrating an ACC record 19th ACC championship, the big story was the enthusiastic proclamation of the freshman phenom that he might record for the NCAA tournament.  There were so many great moments for Duke this season.  A legendary 2nd half comeback win against rival UNC, career high after career high by Nolan Smith on his way to being named as a finalist for every post-season award in existence, a 2nd straight undefeated home record and the nation’s longest home-court winning streak, and Coach K passing legend Dean Smith in all time wins on his way to being the 2nd coach ever to win 900 games in a Division I career.  But to me, watching the season unfold felt like skimming through the pages of a book rushing to get to the end to see how it finishes.  Now’s the time of year to look back and reflect on the great moments this team provided us, but once you find out the hero dies at the end of the second act, the beautiful soliloquy a few scenes earlier just doesn’t have the same impact. 

So what now?  We have more Kyrie drama to look forward to.  Just moments after Nolan Smith and Kyle Singler slipped away from the podium for the last time and the floor was opened up for questions for Mike Krzyzewski, the Charlotte Observer asked Coach K about Kyrie’s plans regarding the NBA draft.  This certain reporter (who will remain unnamed) knew he wouldn’t get an answer, and he knew exactly what kind of reaction he’d get from Coach K.  And still he asked.  This from a member of the same media who writes daily columns laughing at athletic directors for having the audacity to hope to land that elite head coach for their open position.  What’s the difference?  What’s the difference in asking Mike Krzyzewski a question that you KNOW he won’t answer and, for argument’s sake, Debbie Yow thinking she has a shot at an elite basketball coach.  But this is what we have to look forward to this off-season … the “will he” or “won’t he” decision that Kyrie Irving has to make.  I’m not willing to say I feel strongly that he’ll go one way versus the other.  There’s a long list of pros and cons for both decisions.  There will be those who say he’s an idiot if he doesn’t take the money and run, and there will be those who will call him a sell-out if he hangs up that beautiful #1 jersey after 11 glorious performances.  There’s going to be a third group who will sit back without an opinion waiting to jump on whichever of the other two groups gets to have their voices heard.  Me?  I’m in my own group.  I don’t care what Kyrie Irving does as long as he ends up doing what he wants to do.  If he comes back, I’m not going to be in the ear of every Carolina fan telling them our lease on the rivalry has been extended.  If he goes, I’m not going to be looking down our roster next year trying to figure out how we’ll ever win a basketball game.  Kyrie Irving gave me two gifts this year.  The first was the gift of being able to tell my kids and eventually tell their kids that I saw Kyrie Irving play basketball in person.  The second gift, the understanding that expectations can suck the joy out of being a fan.

I remember back in October reading how NBA scouts were crowning Duke as the most complete college basketball team they’ve seen in years.  I remember walking into Cameron on October 23rd to see Duke taking on St. Augustines and looking up at the four National Championship banners picturing how it would look with the 5th hanging beside them.  I remember the feeling after the Kansas State game when my dad turned to me and said “I don’t think anyone can beat us.”  Now, looking back on the season where Duke won 32 games and an ACC Championship, it just seems like this year sucked.  Next year, this will not happen.  I’m going to enjoy the journey.  Next year, regardless of how Duke’s season ends, I refuse to be left wondering “what happened?”

Fredette a Year Late in NPOY Run

If the season ended right now, BYU Senior Jimmer Fredette would likely be the National Player of Year.  After all, he’s had a fantastic season with remarkable offensive statistics, and he’s certainly captured the attention of the media in earning the 2011 “hype vote”.  Perhaps the sportswriters of America feel bad for missing Jimmer’s even more successful campaign in 2010.

According to www.kenpom.com, Jimmer’s 2010 offensive production was without peer.  Fredette ranked 1st among players with at least 28% possessions used with a 120.0 offensive rating and had a 61.5% true shooting percentage while shooting 31.7% of BYU’s shots while he was on the floor.  He also had a 30.4 assist rate, which ranked 75th in the nation.  This offensive output did not generate any conversation about Fredette as a player of the year candidate in 2010. 

Comparing those numbers to Jimmer’s output this year, here is how they stack up:

	2010	2011	Change
Offensive rating	120.00	117.4	-2.6
True shooting %	61.5%	61.4%	-0.10%
Shots taken %	31.7%	35.7%	4.00%
Assist rate	30.4	27.8	-2.6

 

This shows that while experiencing a slight statistical decline in offensive output while taking a higher percentage of BYU’s shots and assisting on less of his team’s field goals, Jimmer has gone from a non-candidate to the front-runner for NPOY.  A simple explanation would be that this year’s competition is less daunting than last year’s NPOY winners Evan Turner and John Wall.  However, when comparing Turner and Wall to Duke’s Nolan Smith, the competition is actually more productive this season than last.

	John Wall ’10	Evan Turner ’10	J. Fredette ’11	Nolan Smith ’11
Offensive rating	108.0	108.5	117.4	118.5
True shooting %	56.2%	58.1%	61.4%	59.1%
Shots taken %	23.4%	30.7%	35.7%	30.6%
Assist rate	34.8	37.4	27.8	32.3

Based on Kenpom’s statistical analysis, Jimmer Fredette was better placed last year as a National Player of the Year favorite.  Seems like the hype is just making up for lost time.