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INDIANAPOLIS – This is just a game
But shit holy.
What Duke did in Kentucky on Tuesday night started the season and may have ended simultaneously. The Blue Devils resembled the Alabama of college basketball, absolutely atomizing the No. 2 team in the nation, 118-84. Forty minutes after 2018-2019, it is already time to ask who will beat these guys.
Kentucky was supposed to be one of the teams that can beat Duke. And Kentucky has just been racing in the boat as if it was Oral Roberts.
It was an intoxicating presentation of everything and well. Whatever it takes to be good at basketball, a Duke team starting with four freshmen did it.
With ease. With balance With confidence. With flamboyance.
With a huge Kentucky crowd having migrated to Interstate 65 and turned this game into a Wildcat home game, the Blue Devils babies plunged into the atmosphere and dispersed. There was no paddling pool in this college basketball business. No trial and error. No worries, growing pains or first-year shots.
When you reach a historic recruiting class, with players nos 1-3-5 in the Rivals.com rankings, you hope they are prematurely ready – but Mike Krzyzewski could not be expected.
"Four freshmen, no matter how talented you are, do not know what they are going to do," Krzyzewski said. "They were gorgeous tonight."
R.J. Barrett (hello, choice number 1 in 2019), Zion Williamson, Cam Reddish and Tre Jones introduced themselves. Barrett, the skilled and assertive Canadian southpaw, scored 33 points, six rebounds and four assists in 32 minutes. Williamson, the amazing Hulk athlete, had 28 points and seven rebounds. The reddish fluid had 22 points and four flights. And poorly overshadowed, Jones had seven assists.
It promises to be a highlight of college basketball this season: forward Duke Zion Williamson is attempting a dunk. It was two of his 28 points on Tuesday against Kentucky. (AP)
They sliced, passed and flew over a disconcerted Kentucky team that really had the benefit of the experience in this game. This was the beginning to end all debut.
"They play like that," said Kentucky coach John Calipari, "they will not lose much, if that's what they are."
Who they are is the most talented team in America. It is rare – really rare – that a team from Calipari Kentucky is outclassed from the point of view of talent, but the Wildcats have been. Then you take into account the fragile defense and the inability to compete tenaciously. That's how it snowballed in the worst defeat of the Cal season in the UK.
He has every year the youngest team in this double Champions Classic program. This time, he did not do it, but the young and best team won. Large. It was a rout before the middle of the first half.
Cal said that he had confided to his team during a brainstorming session: "I think you thought it was going to be easy."
If the Wildcats listened to their fans, it's possible. Kentucky's followers are leading the nation in wild mood swings and after pummeling a few random teams during an exhibition tour to the Bahamas in August, Big Blue Nation rocked into illusions of magnitude. He had visions of a ninth national championship banner – based on an exhibition tour in August.
A real embarrassing game in November, the atmosphere will return in the other direction. Excessive reactions will be manic and comical.
Kentucky will probably do well in the long run.
Duke will probably be better.
Krzyzewski is now defeating Calipari at his own game, the one-and-done system, rent-a-star. Sometimes it works very well, like winning the 2015 national title – the last time Duke or Kentucky qualified for the Final Four.
Sometimes it does not work perfectly. The 2016-18 Duke teams did not win a regular season championship at the Atlantic Coast Conference. Only one of them (2016) has won an ACC tournament title. None of them has reached a Final Four.
This team, despite its massive infusion of talents, had some questions to answer. What is basically a collection of three front wings can coexist? Could they play big enough? Could they share the ball pretty well? Could they know who is the alpha male and who are the supporting actors?
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