Right before Christmas, I flew down to North Carolina to visit Duke, something I’d previously done five times since I graduated in 2001. Though a lot remains unchanged in my life since my last trip three years ago – same job, same apartment, same obsessive sneaker collection – I’ve since met my future wife, which qualifies as a very significant positive change.
When we stopped for a snack at the general store adjacent to my freshman year dorm, a couple of wide-eyed freshmen, still shell-shocked from their first final exams, asked me what had changed about Duke in the thousand years since I’d been a student, and it got me to thinking.
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I watched ESPN’s Fab 5 Documentary the night before I left for vacation and very much enjoyed it, lamenting the fact that I wouldn’t have time to weigh in on Jalen Rose’s comments about Duke. Considering the instant-gratification Twitter-borne sports culture we live in, I assumed that by the time I got back a week later, it would be a non-issue.
It was to my surprise when I got back that it was even more a topic than it had been before I left. I still need a late pass, since the approaching baseball season has sucked up a lot of my time since then, but it’s still on my mind.
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Four years ago, following Duke basketball’s weakest season since I enrolled there in 1997, my dad and I got really excited about the potential of the team’s incoming freshman class.
In late 2007, right after my second marathon, my dad — who isn’t really a sports fan, but got into Duke basketball when I started there — surprised me with Beckett-graded basketball cards he had won on eBay of Nolan Smith, Kyle Singler and Taylor King in McDonald’s All-American jerseys. We arranged the cards under the glass of my coffee table with some other Duke cards we’ve collected over the years, a sort of makeshift micro-Hall of Fame.
And we began to follow their careers together.
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The NCAA Tournament starts this week, and you know where I’ll be?
Cozumel, Mexico, until very late on Saturday.
I have no idea if I’ll have television access to the tournament there, and I’m not bringing a laptop.
And that’s absolutely fine with me.
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The texts and e-mails started rolling in on Wednesday, asking me how I was doing in the wake of Kyrie Irving’s toe injury. They came from people who know how I’ve followed Kyrie’s early career over the last year or so.
I’m obviously concerned, more for him than about anything else. As incredible a player as Kyrie has looked, he’s still a freshman. And I know what it’s like to be a New Jersey kid at Duke, where a 500-mile difference can seem like 500,000 miles when you’re alone.
Despite Mike Krzyzewski saying he could be out for the season, I have to hold on to hope that this year is going to have a happy ending for Kyrie. He’s got a tremendous medical staff on his side, and the healing powers of youth.
But a part of me misses a simpler time, watching Kyrie do his thing at high school games at Kean University. And there’s a part of him that deep down probably agrees with me.
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For a guy who never deigned to spend a day in college, LeBron James has become quite the big man on campus.
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The usual disclaimer: If you’ve been here before, you know I went to Duke. And of course, I’m excited for another year of watching Kyle Singler play, and I certainly don’t mind that it makes the team a title contender again.
But truth be told, it seems like a very good move for him.
The simple thing would have been for the Final Four Most Outstanding Player to strike while the iron was hot and enter the NBA Draft. But just like his coach, Singler is going against the grain somewhat, and to me, he’s doing the right thing.
The biggest reason for that is that all this lockout talk is messing with everyone’s heads.
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Nine years and five days ago, I stood as a senior in front of the Chapel at Duke University and had a conversation with God, as I often did. Usually, we would talk about the health of my friends and family, or what my future would hold. But on this day, I was there to strike a deal.
The terms were that if He could somehow pitch in to help Duke win the National Title game against Arizona that night, I’d never need one of my teams to win again for the rest of my life.
I know, really short-sighted of me. What can I say? I was 21.
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I owe Mike Krzyzewski an apology, as I had months ago written Duke’s methods off as archaic, and not viable for building a championship contender.
It turns out that Coach K was playing chess while everyone else was playing checkers.
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Let it be known that I love it here in New Jersey. North Jersey to me is like Mississippi to Faulkner. It’s a part of the fabric of my life, woven into everything I do.
I’ll almost certainly never leave Bergen County, but if I did, the only other places I’ve considered living are Miami, Durham and Las Vegas, though in recent years I have cultivated a fascination with Los Angeles despite never having been there.
That said, after my second visit this weekend, I came away with real respect for the city of Atlanta. I’m not convinced it makes my short list, but much as I feel about all things Jersey, Atlanta has a manner and rich heritage all its own that give it a fascinating cultural identity, and a refreshing perspective and passion for sports.
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Categories: Basketball, Football, NCAA Hoops Tags: Atlanta, Georgia Tech, Jamal Crawford, Jeff Francoeur, Joe Johnson, Josh Smith, Korean tacos, LeBron James, Michael Vick, William Faulkner
