slydevl
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Word is leaking out that the Duke hoopsters have some unusual plans this fall - a pre-season trip to jolly old England. We've got a few thoughts on why this is an excellent move for the Masters of the Hardwood Universe:
For years, it's been permissible for college sports teams to take overseas tours during breaks in the school year and get in some extra games against foreign teams. Usually these tours take place during the summer - such as the Duke women's recent trip to Australia. However, according the NCAA by-laws, such a trip can be taken during any break in the academic calendar. UNC-CH took advantage of this rule a few years ago and took a northern European tour during Christmas break.
However, in an even more unusual move, it appears that Duke will be heading across the pond to play in England during fall break, which begins Friday, October 11 with classes resuming on Wednesday, October 16. Early reports have the team tentatively scheduled to play six games during the tour, though according to NCAA rules, it seems hard to imagine that there will be time to get that many contests in. While the rules allow a travelling team to play up to 10 games, they also specify that all travel on the foreign trip must take place during the school's vacation period (by-law 30.7.8). Even assuming that the team leaves after classes on Friday and returns Tuesday night / Wednesday morning, they would only have Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday to play. However, as we understand it, the plans are far from finalized, and presumably the coaching staff has a better handle on how this will work than we do.
What does this mean for the 2002-2003 Duke squad? Potentially great things. While these foreign trips have often been a springboard for teams to have successful seasons (more on that in a bit), one drawback to the traditional summer trip is that because of NCAA rules, incoming freshmen weren't allowed to come along. For a team like Duke, a summer trip would have been of questionable utility, given that they'd barely have enough players to field a team. Now, by taking the trip in the fall, after the freshmen matriculate, the Super Six are allowed to travel with the team and play in the games (by-law 30.7.2.1).
But wait! Like a Ronco commercial, that's not all that you get:
In addition to getting in a couple of games against foreign competition (usually local club teams, which in England probably means mostly slow white guys), travelling teams are allowed up to 10 days of pre-trip practice before leaving (30.7.7). Given that the trip is likely to begin on October 11, the team will presumably begin practicing ten days before that, on October 1st. The rest of college basketball begins practicing this season on October 12, giving the Devils a nearly two-week head start on the competition - which would always be a big advantage, even if it weren't for the fact that effectively half the team will be new faces this season, and this will probably be the most crucial pre-season, practice-wise, since the 1999-2000 season.
While according to NCAA rules, a team is allowed to take a foreign trip once every four years, as best we can recall this is the first Duke trip since the nucleus of Coach K's third team hit the Mediterranean region during the summer of 1983. (A planned mid-90's summer trip to Australia was cancelled after several players failed to take care of business academically during the prior spring semester.) After finishing the previous season with a 11-17 record and on the wrong end of a 43-point opening-round loss in the ACC Tournament, the team returned from its summer trip and proceeded to embark on a season that would see them finish 24-10, highlighted by ending Michael Jordan's ACC career with a 77-75 upset win over #1-ranked UNC-CH in the ACC Tournament semi-finals. Two years later, the same core of players would take Duke to the first Final Four of the Coach K era.
Obviously, such improvement is neither possible nor required now, but it still illustrates that a trip like this can be invaluable for developing team chemistry - one of the main areas (along with free throw shooting) where the 2002 edition of the Duke Blue Devils fell sorely short. Contrast that with the 2002 Duke women, who lost their do-everything star Georgia Schweitzer after the 2001 season, went on a tour of Australia, and wound up in the Final Four after blazing through the ACC undefeated.
One unexpected benefit of the women's trip to Australia, incidentally, was that in the process of dropping two games to the Australian Institute of Sport, the coaching staff got to a good look at Jessica Foley, who blistered them for 29 points on 10-11 shooting from the field (5-5 on treys) in the first game. A year later, Foley will arrive on campus as part of the women's #1-rated recruiting class of 2006. With that example in mind, the fact that the men's trip to England will give the family of top recruiting target Luol Deng a chance to see the Devils play in person is probably not just a coincidence.
For years, it's been permissible for college sports teams to take overseas tours during breaks in the school year and get in some extra games against foreign teams. Usually these tours take place during the summer - such as the Duke women's recent trip to Australia. However, according the NCAA by-laws, such a trip can be taken during any break in the academic calendar. UNC-CH took advantage of this rule a few years ago and took a northern European tour during Christmas break.
However, in an even more unusual move, it appears that Duke will be heading across the pond to play in England during fall break, which begins Friday, October 11 with classes resuming on Wednesday, October 16. Early reports have the team tentatively scheduled to play six games during the tour, though according to NCAA rules, it seems hard to imagine that there will be time to get that many contests in. While the rules allow a travelling team to play up to 10 games, they also specify that all travel on the foreign trip must take place during the school's vacation period (by-law 30.7.8). Even assuming that the team leaves after classes on Friday and returns Tuesday night / Wednesday morning, they would only have Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday to play. However, as we understand it, the plans are far from finalized, and presumably the coaching staff has a better handle on how this will work than we do.
What does this mean for the 2002-2003 Duke squad? Potentially great things. While these foreign trips have often been a springboard for teams to have successful seasons (more on that in a bit), one drawback to the traditional summer trip is that because of NCAA rules, incoming freshmen weren't allowed to come along. For a team like Duke, a summer trip would have been of questionable utility, given that they'd barely have enough players to field a team. Now, by taking the trip in the fall, after the freshmen matriculate, the Super Six are allowed to travel with the team and play in the games (by-law 30.7.2.1).
But wait! Like a Ronco commercial, that's not all that you get:
In addition to getting in a couple of games against foreign competition (usually local club teams, which in England probably means mostly slow white guys), travelling teams are allowed up to 10 days of pre-trip practice before leaving (30.7.7). Given that the trip is likely to begin on October 11, the team will presumably begin practicing ten days before that, on October 1st. The rest of college basketball begins practicing this season on October 12, giving the Devils a nearly two-week head start on the competition - which would always be a big advantage, even if it weren't for the fact that effectively half the team will be new faces this season, and this will probably be the most crucial pre-season, practice-wise, since the 1999-2000 season.
While according to NCAA rules, a team is allowed to take a foreign trip once every four years, as best we can recall this is the first Duke trip since the nucleus of Coach K's third team hit the Mediterranean region during the summer of 1983. (A planned mid-90's summer trip to Australia was cancelled after several players failed to take care of business academically during the prior spring semester.) After finishing the previous season with a 11-17 record and on the wrong end of a 43-point opening-round loss in the ACC Tournament, the team returned from its summer trip and proceeded to embark on a season that would see them finish 24-10, highlighted by ending Michael Jordan's ACC career with a 77-75 upset win over #1-ranked UNC-CH in the ACC Tournament semi-finals. Two years later, the same core of players would take Duke to the first Final Four of the Coach K era.
Obviously, such improvement is neither possible nor required now, but it still illustrates that a trip like this can be invaluable for developing team chemistry - one of the main areas (along with free throw shooting) where the 2002 edition of the Duke Blue Devils fell sorely short. Contrast that with the 2002 Duke women, who lost their do-everything star Georgia Schweitzer after the 2001 season, went on a tour of Australia, and wound up in the Final Four after blazing through the ACC undefeated.
One unexpected benefit of the women's trip to Australia, incidentally, was that in the process of dropping two games to the Australian Institute of Sport, the coaching staff got to a good look at Jessica Foley, who blistered them for 29 points on 10-11 shooting from the field (5-5 on treys) in the first game. A year later, Foley will arrive on campus as part of the women's #1-rated recruiting class of 2006. With that example in mind, the fact that the men's trip to England will give the family of top recruiting target Luol Deng a chance to see the Devils play in person is probably not just a coincidence.
