Words can hardly contain the excitement anyone gets from watching a Duke-North Carolina basketball game. I am a Syracuse fan (they also got a win in overtime tonight against the Hoyas of Georgetown), but this was the best game that anyone will see during Rivalry Week. I cannot wait 'til the next game between these two at one of the holy cathedrals of college basketball, Cameron Indoor Stadium.
Austin Rivers. Man, I cannot begin to tell you how big he will get as a player after tonight's game. Everyone knows that Rivers is good: Top five recruit out of high school, starting at Duke as a freshmen, son of Doc Rivers. The man is a legend in the making. He almost single-handedly downed the Tar Heels tonight on the legs of a twenty-nine point effort. However this was not the most showing of the qualities of Austin Rivers. Austin Rivers can only be measured in one quality. One quality that is immeasureable by draftniks and stat sheets, but can be identified by easily identified to the naked eye. That word, ladles and gentlespoons, is what one Bill Raftery coined long ago...
ONIONS!!!
The cajones on this kid! How many freshmen would take that shot over the outstretched arms of Tyler Zeller but Austin Rivers?
Prior to tonight's game, the last 75 matchups between Duke and North Carolina ended with a cumulative score of Duke 5,858-UNC 5,857. You cannot make a rivalry like this in a story book. You cannot make a rivalry like this in a fairy tale or a movie. Sometimes, life serves as the best poetry.
Separated by eight-miles of asphalt along the fabled Tobacco Road, this rivalry is simply the best in college basketball, and possibly sports across the land. I know many will disagree with me (Sox-Yankees, Bruins-Canadiens, Ohio State-Michigan, Texas-Oklahoma, USC-UCLA, Tampa Bay Lightning-Florida Panthers, just to name a few), but I happen to keep my invisible fedora in the Duke-UNC ring, and there it will stay for a long, long time.
And with that, I bid the adieu for the day. But before I go, I'll give you one for the road...
UNNNNNNNNN-YINNNNNNNNNNNNS!
-J Lang
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