Record: 32-7, 11-3 (1st place)
ACC Tournament: Lost in final
NCAA Tournament: Won
Final AP Ranking: 6
All-ACC Players: Christian Laettner (1st), Bobby Hurley (3rd), Thomas Hill (3rd)
All-Americans: Christian Laettner (2nd)
Isn’t it interesting how our memories can take the messy events of the past and subconsciously construct tidy but inaccurate narratives around them? My memory’s narrative of Laettner/Hurley-era Duke was basically this: UNLV embarrassed a young Duke team in 1990, and that team spent the next two years exacting revenge by dominating everyone.
Well, it wasn’t exactly like that, certainly not in 1991. First of all, the 1991 team that got “revenge” on UNLV wasn’t at all the same team as the 1990 team that got humiliated. Laettner and Hurley were still there, but Phil Henderson, Robert Brickey, and Alaa Abdelnaby were not. In their places, Billy McCaffrey, Thomas Hill, and Brian Davis played more prominent roles, and Grant Hill was a freshman starter.
What’s more, the 1991 team wasn’t as dominant as I thought they were. They lost six regular season games, which is kind of a lot for an all-time great team. They spent the year ranked in the 5-10 range, consistently behind Indiana, Arkansas, and of course UNLV. They were embarrassed by Carolina in the ACC Tournament final. They didn’t get a #1 seed in the NCAAs. So their NCAA Tournament success, which in retrospect seems like destiny, did not feel that way at all at the time.
They got a little bit lucky in the regionals. Ohio State was a weak 1 seed that lost in the Sweet 16. Nebraska was a weak 3 seed that lost in the first round. As a result, Duke was able to get to the Final Four without playing higher than a 4 seed.
Which brings us to the rematch with UNLV. I do not hesitate to say that 1991 UNLV was one of the greatest teams in the history of college basketball. I bet many of you can name the starting five: Anderson Hunt, Greg Anthony, Larry Johnson, Stacey Augmon, and George Ackles (the Ringo Starr of the group). Unlike Duke, they were exactly the same team, just a year older and a year better than a team that had won the national championship the year before. Tons of experience with four senior starters and one junior. Going back to the previous season, they had won 45 games in a row. Obviously they played in a weak conference, but with that said, 32 of their 34 wins were by double digits. They averaged 98 points per game. In case anyone might have thought they were a paper tiger, they took an early February trip to #2 Arkansas and beat the Razorbacks 112-105. They were probably the most dominant team in college basketball since 1976 Indiana. There was really no reason to think that Duke was going to win the game.
Grant Hill grabbed the opening tip, went straight to the basket, and scored. Duke scored on its first six possessions – 9 points by Laettner and 4 by Hill. It was clear from the outset that this was going to be a totally different game. Duke’s frontcourt of Laettner, Hill, and Brian Davis outplayed UNLV’s Johnson and Augmon. But UNLV’s backcourt of Anthony and Hunt were terrific and kept the Rebels in it. One of the pivotal moments was Anthony fouling out (on a charge on Brian Davis, of course) with four minutes left. UNLV scored on the ensuing possession to take a five-point lead, but that was their last bucket. They had a defensive lapse without Anthony, leaving Hurley wide open for a three which cut the lead to two. On the ensuing Duke possession, G Hill penetrated and dished to Brian Davis who got the old-fashioned three-point play to give Duke the lead. Johnson was fouled and made one of two, with that hesitation motion he had, to tie it at 77 with 49 seconds left. The shot clock was 45 seconds at the time, so Duke was able to use most of the time on its last possession. Laettner was fouled on a rebound – it wasn’t much of a foul, really – and (of course) sank both free throws. UNLV, again without Anthony, had a disjointed final possession which culminated with an awkward shot by Hunt which never had a chance.
After they pulled the upset, they weren’t done. Similar to 1974 NC State, they faced the danger of the anticlimactic final after the semifinal that seemed like the final. Roy Williams had led the Jayhawks to the final in his third season at Kansas. In their previous three games, they had taken out #3 Indiana, #2 Arkansas, and #4 North Carolina. But behind great performances off the bench by McCaffrey and Davis, Laettner‘s usual brilliance, and Hurley‘s floor leadership, Duke won its first ever national championship.
This wasn’t a perfect team. They were young, playing mostly freshmen and sophomores. They weren’t big, with Laettner as the only legitimate big man. For a really good team, they had an unusually poor turnover margin. And these weaknesses showed up in the Final Four. Both UNLV and Kansas killed Duke on the boards and had fewer turnovers. But when the ball goes in the basket, it has a way of making up for everything else. What this group had in spades was skilled offensive players, athleticism on the wings, and that intangible Laettner/Coach K/Hurley grit, tenacity, toughness, and belief.