Duke Storms Back, Erases 23-Point in the Final 10mins; Zaps the 'Ville

One woulda thought the Blue Devils had learned something from their Maui Invitational loss to Gonzaga.

There are games where simply tossing Dookie jocks on the floor aren't enough.

The Louisville Cardinals just presented one of them.

Amazingly, Duke accepted reality just in time. Coach Mike Krzyzewski made sure of it.

 

It's tough to slog through an entire hoops season and show your A-game in each one of them. There are gonna be grinder games, even for the likes of Duke.

That's not the issue here. It's more like, what took them so damn long to crack the pistachio?

But they did, and Louisville's still gotta be looking at a scoreboard that shows a Blue Devil 71-69 victory when the Cardinals were leading by 23 with nine minutes left to go:

 

More impressive than Zion Williamson's 27 points and 12 boards is the fact that he played the entirety of that history-making nine minutes with four fouls.

Dude's been on fire lately.

 

Take the latest Virginia game.

Yes, their sweep over the Hoos was notable. Their accuracy from downtown was impressive. But Zion's block ...

 

The only thing missing was his cape.

But again, in a season when refs-as-rubes has sunk to tag you're it, eye-rolling lows, Williamson's avoidance of that fifth foul is every bit as astonishing.

 

This was the Dookies' largest comeback since humbling Tulane with a 31-point charge back in 1950.

These occasions thus don't come around very often for the Blue Devils, but you've gotta wonder if, this time, they've learned the difference between grinding and waiting too long to turn on the switch.

After all, the time's fast approaching when another team like Gonzaga's not gonna allow their late-game heroics.