I hear you, CE80. I remember seeing Duke play in the 1978 championship game as an “upstart” (before K arrived). It was a surprise, because the program had been in the dumps for about 10 years prior, but their nucleus of Jim Spanarkel, Mike Gminski, and Gene Banks (all guys who went to Duke because of academics as well as basketball) was good enough to propel them into the championship game against a highly-favored, senior-laden Kentucky squad that featured “Goose” Givens and Rick Robey.
That was 40 years ago. This year, both squads stood good chances of making another deep run in the tourney (and Duke may still make it), but they’re doing it on the strength of “one-and-done” players who are more reminiscent of the MonStars from “Space Jam” than great athletes who were also intelligent students, like Jim Spanarkel, Len Elmore, and Clark Kellogg (and I mentioned these 3 because you can tell by the way they speak that they learned a few things during their times at Duke, Maryland, and Ohio State).
At the risk of turning this into a political discussion (“Make America Great Again”), it’s easy to see why people remember the old days fondly, and would like to see certain elements from those days make a comeback in today’s society...and in today’s world of college basketball.
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