Do I "Hate" Duke or not?

What’s going on folks, time for me to review why people may not be fans of Duke, the new NCAA men’s basketball national champs. But first…

Music to listen to: Illumination by Thievery Corporation



So, Duke won another national title last night and normally I would be pissed about it because like most of America, I’ve developed a dislike for that team over the years. Hate is a strong word but I’ll admit that I’ve had that emotion for them over the years. So, the best way to do that would be to go over the chronological breakdown.

I started to follow college basketball on a consistent basis in the early 1990’s and my favorite team besides Syracuse was UNLV. I was a big Larry Johnson and Greg Anthony fan. I dug the uniforms, Tark, the black sneakers, the whole deal. So when they won the title in 1990, I was feeling it, especially when they laid the smack down to Duke in the title game.

In the 1991 Final Four, Duke had a rematch against UNLV in the semifinals and pulled one of the biggest upsets in history. Of course, calling that dumb foul against Anthony to foul him out of the game changed everything, not that I remember it or anything. So Duke beat Kansas in the title game and the dislike for Duke began.

First it was Christian Laettner. Now that was a dude I hated and he was from my home state. Part of it was racial. He was an annoying white basketball player who was very arrogant and thought he was better than everyone. But to be honest, he was a beast at the college level. But it wasn’t racial because I was a big fan of Bobby Hurley, who was also white.

After UNLV dissolved, my next team of choice was Michigan. I bought into the whole swagger of the Fab Five. However, while Michigan would do some arrogant things, I would feel it but if Duke did the same thing, I wouldn’t like it. It’s a thin line between arrogance and swagger I guess.

When Duke and Michigan met in the title game of 1992, you know who I was cheering for. Of course Duke won and my distain increased.

After that, Laettner and Hurley moved on but I became a fan of Grant Hill, which still exists to this day. He didn’t seem to carry that arrogance that I disliked, if anything he had a humility to his game that was very enjoyable to see. He would score the quietest 20 points you could imagine, throw in eight rebounds and six assists and make it look beautiful.

So this was a quiet lull for me and Duke until the emergence of the most disliked player I’ve ever felt towards in maybe any sport.

Steve Wojohowski

This piece of crap player was insufferable on the highest order. First, he was below-average player who did play hard but would over exaggerate EVERYTHING. Everytime he would dive for a ball, he would make sure that he would take extra long to get back up. Every time he took a charge, and by the way, people talk about how Shane Battier, who I will get to later, trust me, would flop all the time. Well, he had nothing on ole Wojo.

Then there was the floor slapping. We know that you like to play defense because your offense was terrible, but Jesus Christmas, stop with the floor slapping. It doesn’t inspire anyone and it made him look like a donkey and I don’t want to call him the other name for that animal out of kindness, if you get what I’m saying.

Wojo was also a prime example and the first in my experience as a sports fan to fit the role of the scrappy White basketball player.

Wojo would do all of the things above and the media would fawn over him like he was the only player on the floor that was giving his best effort which is crap because the majority of the players out there are working their hardest, they just didn’t stoop to the antics of Wojo to gain extra attention. Plus, the fact that he was an unathletic White basketball player portrayed the image to the sports media, who are mostly White males, that hey, we could be out there too. Awful.

So my hate for Duke was very strong with Wojo but unfortunately for my thirst for distain, he graduated. Thankfully, he’s on their current coaching staff and every time I see him, a little hate come out.

Then in the late 1990’s to early 2000’s, it was hit and miss for me. Liked Elton Brand, didn’t like Mike Dunleavy. Felt neutral on Jay Williams, for some reason really didn’t like Carlos Boozer.

Finally, another person came along to return the hate.

Shane Battier.

Unlike Wojo, Battier was actually a talented player, dare I say one of the best players of that decade, but the love for him reached overkill during Duke’s 2001 national title year.

He was a flopper who would acting would reach overkill as well. But there were two things about his portrayal that wrinkled me wrong way. First, when he decided to stay for his senior year, it was hailed as a gutsy decision that showed his true commitment to college athletics.

I follow the NBA just as much, if not more than NCAA men’s basketball, and he would have been a late first rounder in the draft if he left after his junior year. It was a smart financial decision. If Battier was guaranteed to be a top-five pick, he would have packed up his bags in Durham so quick that Coach K wouldn’t have known what to do.

The second thing was that he was the single force leading that team to a title. So I guess Dunleavy, Boozer, Williams and Chris Duhon COMING OFF THE BENCH had nothing to do with the success.

Plus, a new adopted men’s basketball team of mine, Arizona, lost that title game in 2001 to them so three teams that I followed on a consistent basis, UNLV in 1991, Michigan in 1992 and Arizona in 2001, all lost chances to win a national title because of Duke.

Oh, forgot maybe the largest factor in my original distain for Duke.

I was rejected by the school when I applied in 1999.

I applied to 13 schools and got into 11 of them. Duke and Emory rejected me, not that I still remember that or anything.

Looking back, I’m glad that I didn’t get in because even when I visited Duke in 1998, I didn’t feel a good vibe about it and applied anyway because it’s a really good school. But if I ended up going there, I probably wouldn’t have been happy there.

So after Battier graduated, some players came and went that I didn’t care about. JJ Reddick was overrated, Sheldon Williams was bad, Greg Paulus was dislikeable but everyone didn’t care for him.

It became less about hating Duke but more disliking the portrayal of what the school was supposed to be.

Behind sports media members like Dick Vitale, Duke represents everything that we would want from an elite college athletic program. Strong academics, disciplined mentality, “good” players on and off the court, etc.

I don’t have specific examples of this but I will say that when you reach the level of program like Duke, North Carolina, Kansas, Kentucky, etc., some lines are blurred. Package deals take place. Players grades are manipulated to keep eligibility. Relatives find good jobs in the same city so that they can attend all of the home games and find the money to travel on the road.

The point is that we shouldn’t be so trustworthy that everything is on the up and up at Duke. You have to be cynical of what you see at that level.

In the end, I guess I just matured and stopped wasting my time hating a college basketball team. Things like employment, family, God and other things became more of a priority.

Sure, I have my moments with Tennessee athletics, especially men’s basketball and football, but it hasn’t reached a level of hate that I had for Duke in the early 1990’s.

So when they won the title last night, I was OK with it. But when I saw the celebration and Wojo jumping up and down, the hate returned for a moment and I liked it because passion for sports is good.