The Chronicle
See Inside Grayson Allen enjoys Senior Night win Page 6
T H E I N D E P E N D E N T D A I LY AT D U K E U N I V E R S I T Y
MONDAY, MARCH 5, 2018 DUKECHRONICLE.COM
ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTEENTH YEAR, ISSUE 65
ZOMBIES RISE, BENCHES FALL Blue Devils rally from 13-point second-half deficit to top Tar Heels By Hank Tucker Sports Editor
A Blue Devil team that became unstoppable down the stretch in close games from November through January looked dormant for the last several weeks. But Saturday night, “Zombie Duke” showed it was not dead for good on the biggest of regular-season stages. No. 5 Duke rallied from a 13-point second-half deficit to top ninth-ranked North Carolina 74-64 in its regularseason finale on Senior Night at Cameron Indoor Stadium. It was the fourth time this season the Blue Devils trailed by at least 13 after the break before coming back to win, with Marvin Bagley III scoring 21 points and grabbing 15 rebounds to lead the way. “We came out so anxious for this game, me included. I think we were too excited, just a little bit too frantic, too fast, too quick on everything we were doing,” senior captain Grayson Allen said. “In the second half, we played with no fear. We played like we had 100 games left, with free money, with confidence. We just went out there and hooped.” The Blue Devils (25-6, 13-5 in the ACC) started chipping away a few minutes into the second half, but a 3-pointer and a 3-point play from Bagley on back-to-back possessions trimmed the deficit to just one at 50-49 with 10 minutes to go. Gary Trent Jr. then put Duke in front for the first time of the half with a triple from the top of the key to make Cameron as loud as it has been all season and cap an extended 23-8 run in a seven-minute span. The teams traded leads on 3-pointers four times in the next three minutes, but a banked runner by Trevon Duval and another triple from Trent sparked a 10-2 run that gave Duke the lead for good. The Blue Devils made eight straight shots from the field from the 8:30 mark to the 1:04 mark of the game after they did not make a single field goal in the last seven minutes of Monday’s loss at Virginia Tech. “Literally, Coach just said, ‘Play basketball.’ He didn’t really have any X’s and O’s or any specific plays for us to run,” Duval said. “Just play normal basketball like we were playing pickup, and that’s what we did.” Allen struggled to run the offense in his final home game,
Jim Liu | News Photography Editor
turning the ball over a career-high six times and shooting just 5-of-14 from the field. North Carolina guard Joel Berry II pressured him on almost every possession and never let Duke’s offense find a rhythm, but Duval took over ball-handling duties for the decisive second-half run. Duval came off the bench for the second straight game, but he played most of the second half and dished out six assists without committing a turnover. An alley-oop from Duval to Bagley with less than a minute and a half left sealed the deal. “In a game like this, Grayson got worn out because of the emotion
of the night. It’s his last game, and taking him off the ball there for a while in the second half, we were able to run better offense,” head coach Mike Krzyzewski said. “We’re trying to condense four years in one here, but Trevon was huge for us.” The last eight minutes of the first half were disastrous for the Blue Devils, as they missed seven straight shots from the field and went scoreless for more than four minutes while North Carolina (22-9, 11-7) turned a four-point deficit into a nine-point lead with an 18-5 run. See M. BASKETBALL on Page 7
Students react to win against Carolina By Likhitha Butchireddygari | Editorin-Chief
Lexi Kadis | Senior News Reporter After Duke defeated UNC Saturday night, The Chronicle caught up with students at the celebratory bonfire about their thoughts on the game:
Charles York | Associate Photography Editor Students from all over campus rushed to the bonfire on Abele Quad to celebrate a longstanding tradition of burning benches.
“WHOOOOOOO! We can feel the energy. The vibe on campus is amazing. We’re so excited!”—first-year Anna Klingensmith “Go Bull City. We’re so happy for Grayson. We’re seniors, so this is icing on the cake.”— seniors Christina Cheng and Jasmine Wang “I was losing hope. I’m usually not that into sports, but that was exhilarating.”—junior Vivian Luo “[The game] was a lot of fun. Duke was down at the beginning of the second half. I
INSIDE — News 2 | Sports 5 | Crossword 9 | Opinion 10 | Serving the University since 1905 |
@dukechronicle @dukebasketball |
was telling the person next to me that even though we’re down, we’re always amazing at coming back from deficits. And I knew that we could come back and beat UNC tonight.”— sophomore Daniel Castro “I’m really proud of our team. We pulled through during the second half.”—sophomore Samantha Garland “I’m very excited it was not a boring game. I’m happy I lived on West [Campus] this year so that I could see the bonfire.”—sophomore Paula Moreno “It was really lit.”—sophomore Della Tao, describing the game and the bonfire. “I always enjoy primal traditions like burning the bench. I appreciate the administration allowing us to engage in this behavior. Go Duke!”—junior Jeffrey See STUDENTS on Page 12 @thedukechronicle | © 2018 The Chronicle