The replay: Duke basketball puts bow on season, UNC transfers, plus hockey, baseball
Just because the college basketball tournaments are over doesn’t mean the news in that realm stopped. And it was a busy week for a couple of the Triangle’s top programs.
On Thursday night, Duke officially put a bow on the Mike Krzyzewski era, holding its end-of-season banquet, with a backdrop of a pair of banners that will ultimately hang from the rafters in Cameron Indoor Stadium.
“I’m the luckiest guy on the planet,” the 75-year-old Krzyzewski said. “I’m at peace.”
Krzyzewski’s final Duke team finished the season 32-7, winning the ACC regular-season championship with a 16-4 league mark and reaching the 13th Final Four in his 42 seasons as their head coach. No other coach has led a men’s college team to that many Final Four appearances.
Though the Blue Devils lost, 81-77, to rival North Carolina in the national semifinals and were unable to claim the sixth national championship of Krzyzewski’s career, he refused to let that sour his feelings about this season’s team.
“You guys are winners,” Krzyzewski said to his team. “There are a lot of banners in here, and you have two of them. For me, you made my final season one of the happiest that I’ve ever had. An unbelievable season.”
The team and new Duke coach Jon Scheyer arranged for the night to end on a happy note.
After his speech, Scheyer asked the players and coaching staff, including Krzyzewski and his wife, Mickie, to come back to the stage. Team captain Wendell Moore handed a surprised Krzyzewski an eight-week-old silver Labrador puppy, meant to be the new dog Krzyzewski needed after his dog, Blue, died last summer.
The puppy, who the staff and Krzyzewski’s grandchildren have given the name `Coach,’ playfully licked the smiling Krzyzewski on his face a few times.
UNC’s roster in flux
Meanwhile, the team that knocked Duke out of the Final Four saw a few things happen to its roster this week. First, a pair of players announced they were headed to the transfer portal.
Dawson Garcia and Anthony Harris, neither of whom finished the season on the Tar Heels’ active roster, announced Wednesday that they were leaving the school.
“Congratulations to all of Tar Heel Nation on a great finish to the season!” Garcia wrote on Twitter. “With all that has happened with my family this past year, I have decided to stay in closer proximity to them. Thank you Tar Heel Nation for accepting me into your family … all the best!”
Garcia, a 6-foot-11, 235-pound center from Prior Lake, Minn., transferred to UNC from Marquette and started 12 games for first-year head coach Hubert Davis. He appeared in 16 games, averaging 9 points and 5.5 rebounds.
Garcia’s last game with the Tar Heels came against Wake Forest on Jan. 22 when he scored seven points in 18 minutes off the bench. On Feb. 10, Davis announced that Garcia would miss the remainder of the season so he could stay in Minnesota and be close to his grandmother, who was dealing with an illness.
Harris, a sophomore guard from Virginia who called his time at UNC an “honor,” had not played for the Tar Heels since scoring 5 points in a Jan. 8 win against Virginia. The school announced Jan. 21 that Harris would be unavailable to play for the remainder of the season but that he’d continue practicing with the team.
Mixed bag on the ice
The Hurricanes started the week on a roll, and then hit a stumbling block against a team that is far out of the playoff race, the Detroit Red Wings.
Let’s start with the positive news: The Hurricanes started the week with a win over the Anaheim Ducks, one of the young, up-and-coming teams in the NHL and a team just outside of the playoff picture in the West. It was also one final chance for the Canes fans to watch retiring veteran Ryan Getzlaf. The Canes spoiled his final trip to Raleigh with a 5-2 win.
The big matchup of the week was a head-to-head contest with the New York Rangers, with whom the Canes are battling for the Metro Division lead. Carolina went into Madison Square Garden and won for just the second time in 15 games at the venerable venue. At the time, the lead in the division spiked to four points, but a Wednesday New York win, and a stinker of a Canes loss to Detroit on Thursday tightened things back up with seven games to play in the regular season.
Play ball (at home)
After starting the season on the road, the Durham Bulls returned to the fanfare of a home opener on Tuesday, and a full slate of games against the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp.
After falling in the opener, the Bulls rebounded with a hitting display on Wednesday, and a comeback win on Thursday. Ryan Boldt, Jonathan Aranda and René Pinto each had two hits Thursday, and Cal Stevenson laced a triple in the bottom of the eighth to score Tristan Gray for the game-winning run.
Steve Wiseman and Jonas Pope IV contributed to this story.
