How Duke’s trip to California is creating Bay Area buzz with Blue Devils fans
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Duke men make first ACC West Coast swing, playing California then Stanford.
- Bay Area surge: 9,700 alumni drive ticket demand and sellout expectation.
- Coaches cite ACC West games as recruiting tool and national exposure boost.
Jessica Stankiewicz is a Duke graduate who has lived in California for more than 20 years, pulling for Duke basketball from afar.
Stankiewicz’s father lives in Philadelphia and she has joined him at some Duke games in New York City. She has been to two games the past two decades at Cameron Indoor Stadium, and went to the 2025 ACC Tournament in Charlotte, but mostly has been a TV watcher.
That will change this week when the No. 6 Blue Devils play at California on Wednesday and then at Stanford on Saturday in their first two-game ACC West Coast swing. Stankiewicz has tickets for both.
“It’s nice Duke is coming to me versus me always going to see them,” she said Monday, laughing. “I’m personally super excited. I can just hop on the BART train for $3 and six minutes later I’ll be in downtown Berkeley and can walk over and see the Blue Devils play.”
The Golden Bears are expecting a soldout Haas Pavilion for Wedneday’s game, which begins at 11 p.m. EST. The Blue Devils women’s team played at Cal and Stanford last week — winning twice before smaller crowds – but Duke’s men’s team, and the top 10 ranking, is creating a lot of buzz and demand for tickets with 9,700 Duke alumni living in the San Francisco Bay area.
Cal has not beaten a top 10 team since February 2014, when the Bears knocked off Arizona, then No. 1, at Haas.
The Bears (13-4, 1-3 ACC) also host No. 14 North Carolina on Saturday after the Tar Heels take on Stanford on Thursday as Duke (15-1, 4-0 ACC) and UNC swap opponents.
“It’s great for our program, and it’s great for our fans,” Cal coach Mark Madsen said Monday. “Carolina is having a great year, Duke’s having a great year. We’re having a strong start here, also. We’re coming off a tough road trip but played a lot better in game two.
“So I’m excited about the games, excited about the crowd and our guys are ready to go.”
ACC life now includes cross-country travel
The Golden Bears’ recent road trip took them to Virginia and Virginia Tech, taking an 84-70 loss to the Cavaliers and then losing at Tech, 78-75. It was the first of their four ACC trips back East – Cal later plays at Florida State and Miami, Syracuse and Boston College, then Georgia Tech and Wake Forest in the regular season.
“The thing I got across to our team is that Stanford and Cal have it worse than we do in terms of travel,” Duke coach Jon Scheyer said Monday.
Madsen said Cal joining has been a boon for recruiting, noting his pitch now can include the opportunity to play games at such basketball spots as Cameron Indoor Stadium or the Smith Center and have them come out West.
“Absolutely,” he said. “We’ve talked about that with multiple recruits and it’s a huge selling point to be able to play against these top teams.
“You look at the ACC as a whole and it’s exploding from a basketball perspective. There’s not an easy night in the ACC. You’ve got Louisville, you’ve got Miami, every team is tough. So it is something we’ve discussed in recruiting and it’s helped us in recruiting.”
So, too, Stanford coach Kyle Smith.
“It’s a chance to bump with the big boys, and on our own floor,” Smith said. “That’s awesome for fans and relevancy.
“These are global brands in basketball, so it puts us on a level and with an opportunity you didn’t have in the Pac-12. Obviously, Arizona and UCLA are good but are more regional programs.”
How will Cal plan to stop Cameron Boozer?
Madsen will be the latest coach to game plan for Duke freshman Cameron Boozer, who has been named ACC rookie of the week six times and has become a candidate for national player of the year. Madsen said he played in the NBA against Boozer’s father, Carlos, and later coached him as an assistant with the Los Angeles Lakers.
Madsen said he can see a lot of the same basketball traits of the father in his two sons at Duke, Cameron and Cayden.
“You can see the basketball IQ, you can see the toughness, you can see the knowledge of the game,” he said. “Both those guys are just huge impact players for their team.”
Stankiewicz headed up an effort to hold a gathering for Duke fans on Wednesday night at a Berkeley restaurant. She said she wasn’t sure at first how many might want to attend.
“We’ve increased the capacity a couple of times,” she said. “I think we have 125 people now and 75 more on the wait list, so demand has far exceeded what we expected.”
Stankiewicz said she holds a master’s degree from Cal-Berkeley and attends Cal basketball games, but that won’t change her allegiance Wednesday night when the ball goes up. While at Duke, she was a committed “Cameron Crazy” and tented out in “K-ville” for tickets.
“I’m a Duke alum at heart,” she said. “I’ll be cheering for them one hundred percent.
“It’s weird to have California schools in the ACC and I don’t love all the conference realignment going on. But I’m super happy to see my Blue Devils come here.”
