Staff photo by Chuck Liddy
DURHAM — Three female Duke students with painted faces held fishing poles and a sign that described Sunday afternoon’s catch at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
“Wahoo 4 Dinner,” the sign read.
Duke might be destined to lose its No. 1 national ranking Monday because it lost at Wake Forest last week, but the Blue Devils looked like an elite team as they devoured Virginia 79-54 on Sunday.
The ferocious defensive pressure that now has held six of seven ACC opponents below 59 points forced an astounding 17 first-half turnovers. Freshman guard Sylven Lanesberg, who led the Cavaliers with 20 points, committed four turnovers in the first 3 minutes, 32 seconds.
Two of those turnovers came on charging fouls, quickly sending Landesberg to the bench.
Forward Gerald Henderson scored 16 of his 18 points in the first half, four of them on steals that he turned into dunks for the Blue Devils. Point guard Nolan Smith contributed 15 points for Duke, which led 43-21 at halftime.
Duke (19-2, 6-1 ACC) holds a one-game lead over rival North Carolina (19-2, 5-2) in the ACC standings. Virginia (7-10, 1-5) suffered its fifth straight loss.
Comments
Duke win
Sun, 02/01/2009 - 23:55 — suzyb3So, Duke "looked like an elite team as they devoured Virginia 79-54 on Sunday"?
I should hope so, since the Blue Devils are 19-2, and 6-1, while Virginia is 7-10, 1-5.
Fans might want to wait to hold their heads until they play -- and beat -- a comparable team.
funny
Sun, 02/01/2009 - 17:31 — gvillegatrlet me set this one up for you all here at ACCNow.
wife didnt get enough food for the party tonight so I had to head out for the Food Lion for more. My Sirius radio was tuned in to the Mad Dog channel and for some reason they had the DUIke game on it. Sirius does not cover ACC sports.
when I got back in the car, the game was over and Harris was doing a post game with Rat. no one else in the room, just those two?? never have I heard of that before. but this is not my point.
Harris goes on to congratulate Rat for his 5-1 record in the ACC and quickly changes it to 6-1. Rat goes, "don't be like the local news stations around here and wait 24 hours to post a win for us!" admittedly, I laughed my ass off!
then Harris says, "Rat, you got 3 games in 7 days coming up." Rat goes, "yea, we start off with ClemPson and like everyone else they have a week off before they play us." I'm not laughing this time.
IS he always like this in his post game reports? Does he cry at home when no one is around too? Is he a bigger prick than me? I think he is, does and most defintely fo sure.
maybe some of you DUIke fans can answer the first two ...
Coach K
Mon, 02/02/2009 - 01:15 — devilishG'ville Gaitor,
I'm not the biggest fan of Bob Harris either. He tends to editorialize like crazy on the radio and I usually tune in during the timeouts to hear Matthew Laurence with the huddle.
While I thought that it was stupid for K to complain about the ranking (and I still do). I have to state that he makes a good point about the time off factor. This is the 4th opponent that has a week off to play vs. Duke, and I think that Clemson (next game) will make the fifth. The Heels have three such situations. I would say that someone would need to look into that.
But don't take my word for it. Here's what Dino Gaudio had to say after Wake lost to GT the other nite:
Gaudio noted his team had a full week to prepare for wins over Duke and North Carolina, while Georgia Tech had six days to practice for the Demon Deacons.
"Timing in these games is so important, don't think it's not," Gaudio said. "But Georgia Tech deserved to win."
Well, I'm glad that we got that out of the way......it does make a difference. A big difference.
Sirius-ly, Gatr
Sun, 02/01/2009 - 21:41 — JPDOhioCheck your subscription. XM has ACC Sports coverage and now I am getting Syrius channels after it merged with XM. They just showed up one day. You may have ACC coverage now that you never had before.
XM is advertising the best of Sirius...
Sun, 02/01/2009 - 22:29 — UNC1998Is this what you got JPDOhio?
Dukes seems to have a very nice scoring defense. Opposingly, they don't seem to light it up on offense. That should make for an interesting match up with UNC.
XM on Sirius
Mon, 02/02/2009 - 11:02 — JPDOhioApparently, Sirius subscribers can add on a sports package that includes football and basketball in the major conferences currently available on XM. The ACC is part of the package.
It may not be worth your while, since you can get local radio broadcasts of the games you are most interested in. But for those of us outside of North Carolina or if you travel and don't want to be switching stations constantly, it is great.
Not sure
Sun, 02/01/2009 - 23:41 — JPDOhioACC B-ball is on XM 190 and 191. All I know is I get some sirius stuff now I didn't have before. If I figure anything else out I'll let u know.
Duke Win
Sun, 02/01/2009 - 17:21 — topping241I'm surprised UVA didn't forfeit prior to the start of this game. The Hoo's are awful this year and it seems that most of their fans wish their season would end. Unfortunately, this contest didn't require a great deal of "sweat" on Duke's part. Liberty University beat UVA earlier in the season. Enough said......