Duke Basketball 2023-2024

[Devilsforlife]

I was thinking earlier, that despite the uncertainty surrounding the future with players leaving early, NIL, conference realignment, etc, there are no shortage of potentially horrifying moments we thankfully avoided.

-UNC beating us in the Final Four any time in the Roy era, and especially circa 2005-2012 when CBB was more relevant and Duke hate was organic and not mostly forced. Never really got close to a matchup, though.
-Duke overachieving in the RS and getting a #1 seed in 2012 or 2014 and going on to lose to the 16 seed, which could’ve plausibly happened. That would’ve been a seismic event I’m not sure our program recovers from.
-Heyward’s heave falling. I’d probably be dead now.
-Calipari completing the 40-0 season by beating Duke in the title game.
-Zion going to UNC and winning it all on a 38-40 win super team.
-UNC winning the title after beating us in the FF last year.

We dodged all these bullets, and at this point, CBB is dying and well on its way to becoming an off-season plaything for wealthy football-focused SEC programs, K and Roy are both gone, and the stakes simply aren’t as high as they once were.

 

[DurhamSon]

What would really been awful about the Zion-to-UNC scenario, is that we still would have been ranked ahead of them as favorites because pre-season, RJ and Reddish were seen as the studs/stars, with Zion considered more of an athletic but raw prospect. What would have ensued is not only them destroying us on route to a likely title, but us flopping as like a 5 to 8 seed b/c of, well, RJ and Reddish as #1s. That would have been much worse than 2017

 

[Devilsforlife]

A 10th Final Four and 4th title - the 2nd in 3 years - for Roy would’ve been fucking brutal. The GOAT debate would be much less settled if this had gone down, especially given UNC’s probable dominance.

 

[Devilsforlife]

I will say too, that if CBB remains this chaotic, and a young coach winds up cranking out 3-4 titles, they’d have a serious argument for at least matching K in the GOAT debate (not that anyone will care, given the death of the sport).

Parity is that much higher nowadays, and you‘re not keeping talent in school for 3-4 years anymore. Similar to how K‘s 5 rings are generally seen as much more impressive than Wooden‘s 10 given what CBB was in the 60s/70s. I’d consider weighing a portal era title as worth 1.3 or 1.5 compared to one from circa 1980-2020.

 

[LastHearth]

If it remains this chaotic 40% of current division I schools will shut down.

 

[DurhamSon]

Just going to put this here...

Forgive my ignorance, but what's a collective?

Interesting this comes up for discussion today by Adam, since I had never heard of this before today either. However Duke athletics just sent out a fan satisfaction survey and a section of it was dedicated to NIL/Collective topics. Namely, what the survey taker knew about it, if they would donate to one, if it would be in combination or at the expense of their Iron Dukes donations, etc. Most interestingly I thought, how important the survey taker believed NIL is in recruiting/retaining athletes.

Adam might have tipped the program's hand to this when he tried guilt-tripping everyone on TDD into buying some $100 T-shirt from "The Brotherhood's" NIL merch website, but I think the next step by the program is going to be trying to squeeze donors to start funding a collective in addition to the many thousands they are already donating towards the Iron Dukes. And with how rich and old so many are, they damn well better

 

[deepdarkblue]

I'm going to start a Duke-Forum OnlyFans and we can donate our profits to the collective.

 

[Bullettoothtony]

I'm going to start a Duke-Forum OnlyFans and we can donate our profits to the collective.

We just need to make Bhad Bhabie an Iron Duke.

 

[rome8180]

Wouldn't Mia Khalifa be more appropriate?

 

[deeyoukayeee]

Belle Knox? Or does that belong in the Alumna thread?

 

[rome8180]

Yeah, that's actually who I meant. I'm not sure how I got them confused. I guess I'll have to watch more porn to ensure that this doesn't happen again.

 

[JimboJones]

-Heyward’s heave falling. I’d probably be dead now.

K would have been absolutely roasted to God and outer space because he told Zoubek to miss.
Singler getting lit up on the midcourt screen.
It was almost a Duke hater's dream.

 

[Bullettoothtony]

-Heyward’s heave falling. I’d probably be dead now.

K would have been absolutely roasted to God and outer space because he told Zoubek to miss.
Singler getting lit up on the midcourt screen.
It was almost a Duke hater's dream.

If that shot goes in it replaces the Laettner shot as the most iconic in tournament history.

Would've been biblical. David slays Goliath on a half court heave?

That's the first thing Mars colonizers would see when they got off the spacecraft. I'm assuming of course that Musk hates Duke.

 

[rome8180]

That was 100% an illegal screen by that goon Matt Howard. No one would have cared.

 

[LastHearth]

Speaking of NIL, what if a guy like Flip went to Gofundme and started a “fund my sophomore year at Duke” campaign, set the goal for 1 million, and have some tiered rewards. Like$25 you get a thank you card $100 you get a TShirt $200 you get a game jersey, $300 you get the jersey and a signed ball. And a grand reward of $10,000 you get to meet me and sit with my family for a home game. He could probably raise 1 million I’d think.

 

[rome8180]

Pretty sure we'd have to set up a fake company he could endorse for that not to be a violation.

 

[Bullettoothtony]

That was 100% an illegal screen by that goon Matt Howard. No one would have cared.

Absolutely. And it's not remotely debatable.

 

[StopThePumpFakesShav]

Yeah, that's actually who I meant. I'm not sure how I got them confused. I guess I'll have to watch more porn to ensure that this doesn't happen again.

"Podcast prep."

 

[aiw]

Pornhub tax writeoff

 

[rome8180]

John has a company credit card he can use for podcast expenses. But I think CBS might raise an eyebrow at that one.