After all the hype, after all the hoopla, one part pilgrimage, one part farewell, maybe a little bit spectacle, Duke and North Carolina finally got down to business Saturday night.
And then the unthinkable happened. Mike Krzyzewski lost his last game in Cameron. The final was 94-81.
It was a lot closer than the final score suggests. Indeed Duke dominated the middle part of the game and seemed on the verge of delivering a knockout blow several times.
But as Paolo Banchero said “they wouldn’t go away.”
It would be disingenuous and unfair to deny North Carolina full credit for the win.