Duke Losing In February Is The Greatest Tradition In All Of Sports
I know it's Super Bowl Sunday but I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about the greatest tradition in sports staying alive yesterday as the Duke Blue Devils started off yet another season with a loss to Air Force. This is now the 3rd time in the past 5 seasons that Duke has lost to Air Force, and the 2nd time since 2017 that they've lost the season opener to the Falcons.
It's honestly just so impressive how Duke does this year after year. Almost to the point where I think the NCAA needs to step in here and do something about it because I'm almost certain that they're throwing games in February now. You look back to that 2017 year. Duke loses the season opener to Air Force and then they go 4-1 in March, 4-1 in April, and then eventually lost to Ohio State in the quarterfinals. Then you go to 2018 where they got upset as the #1 team in the nation at Penn on February 24th. Duke would go on to lose in the National Championship that year to Yale. Last year they got upset by High Point in February, and then finished their season with an overtime loss to Virginia in the quarterfinals.
You look back on the years that they won National Championships. In 2010, they started off the year 2-3 in the first full month of the season. In 2013, they started off the year 2-4 in the first full month of the season with 3 of those losses coming in February. In 2014 they were a wagon and went undefeated in February, but lost their first 2 games in March.
So this is what Duke does year after year. They rack up a couple of losses early in the season. Then everybody starts talking about "is this the year that Duke is finally dead?". They drop in the polls. They get themselves out of the legitimate contender conversations. And then at the very least, they end up being one of the final 8 teams playing DI college lacrosse in May. It's a galaxy brain approach by John Danowski and it works every year. He knows that there are a certain number of losses his team needs to have every year so he figures he'll get most of them out of the way in February so they can just fuck shit up in April and May. It's genius, Lloyd. Sheer genius.
P.S. - Speaking of ACC lax, Chris Gray is a confirmed sick son of a bitch. 4 goals in the 1st quarter of his UNC debut after transferring from Boston. What a freak.