You don’t tug on Superman’s cape. You don’t spit in the wind. You don’t pull the mask of the old Lone Ranger. And you don’t get down early to Duke, which defeated North Carolina 75-58 in the ACC tournament championship game. <\/p>\n
I’m not sure I’ve seen Duke any more excited to beat Carolina. Nolan Smith, the tournament MVP who led all scorers with 20 points, said it was almost like winning the national championship.<\/p>\n
The Blue Devils defense cut off the passing lanes and Smith seemed to never get tired hawking Carolina point guard Kendall Marshall, who had five turnovers. “We had a freshman point guard who did not play well today,” UNC coach Roy Williams said. “Nolan Smith forced us to start our offense 45 feet from the basket. Kendall didnt feel like he could get past him.”<\/p>\n
Duke was the better team overall and especially the better three-point shooting team (nine threes vs. two for UNC) but the officials amateurish effort kept Carolina from making any comeback. A kind Tyler Zeller of UNC said, “The refs let us play and I don’t think we adapted to it as well as they did.”<\/p>\n
With just over nine minutes left, Duke’s Kyle Singler barreled into Justin Knox, nothing called. Two seconds later Miles Plumlee lost the handle on a shot but UNC’s John Henson was called for a foul. If you have the game on tape, I urge you to try to find the Henson foul. <\/p>\n
Carolina had a chance to cut the deficit down to 10 points but Duke defender Miles Plumlee, two feet from the basket mind you, moved into – that’s moving forward into – a driving Justin Watts and Watts was called for a charge.<\/p>\n
With less than five minutes to play, Nolan Smith used an arm to get Zeller off of him. The foul was called on Zeller and Smith hit two free throws.<\/p>\n
With less than four minutes to play, Duke’s Seth Curry reached in on a driving Leslie McDonald to tip the ball. McDonald managed to keep control but officials, obviously not having seen the Curry tip, called McDonald with double dribbling.<\/p>\n
The officials also dampened Carolina’s spirits in the first half when they waved off a Dexter Strickland dunk, calling him for a charge. That call was wrong on so many levels. First, Singler was too close to the basket to draw a charge. Second, Strickland actually went to the left of Singler and hardly even touched him. It certainly wasn’t enough contact for a charge. The basket would have cut the Duke lead to five. Instead, the game never got closer.<\/p>\n