Duke and Butler in the 2010 Championship

Posted On: April 4, 2010 By: Cliff Comments: (more)

Duke will be playing for the 2010 NCAA Championship Monday night against the Butler Bulldogs in their home town. You can call it David vs Goliath or a true Hoosiers story for the Bulldogs but no matter what it is going to be one exciting match up in my opinion.

Can Duke win it’s first NCAA championship since 2001 when they defeated Arizona 82-72. In that game, Duke used a 47-39 second half to get by the Wildcats and that is how I see the game against Butler playing out for the Blue Devils. Sure the 01 team was more stacked with their starting five but this years Duke team has three scorers and four big men that know their roles and play them very well.

Butler will attempt to slow down the game and play in a half court set while chewing up the clock and knock down the open shots that they get. Duke will be fine in the half court I think as it allows their players to get back on defense and not have a speedy point guard running right at the basket drawing fouls or getting wide open layups.

Butlers Matt Howard will be a game time decision as he sustained a mild concussion in their game against Michigan State on Saturday. Don’t expect Howard to sit on the bench and watch his team play in the championship though. Howard will be out there with his teammates as they attempt to pull off another victory and bring the championship back to their school just six miles from Lucas Oil Stadium.

In the end I think Duke just has too much offensive firepower with Nolan Smith, Jon Scheyer and Kyle Singler. Any one of those players can go for 25 points if needed and if they all three score over 15 points like they did on Saturday against West Virginia well then you can expect a 10-12 point victory for the Blue Devils. Current odds have the Devils favored by 7.5 points.

If you are looking for tickets for the game, they are still available and actually pretty cheap in my opinion unless you want to sit on the baseline in the first 20-30 rows. Head on over to Ticket City and check out what they have left for seats.

I will be tweeting live during the game tonight so feel free to add @justdukecom to your twitter account!

Category: Duke Basketball

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2 Responses to “Duke and Butler in the 2010 Championship”

ggjones Says:
April 5th, 2010 at 7:51 am
If you put a blue hood on Dukes head coach he would look like their mascot. What a sour puss.
Patrick Stephenson Says:
April 6th, 2010 at 7:33 am
Coach-K one of the finest gentleman I have ever had the pleasure to meet is in no way a mascot, if you had the Intelligence to follow his career you would find that this Man loves basketball and his players and is a dedicated Coach,and by the way “One if not The Best Coach of ALL time”!ALL in All he is just like any good Coach,Passonate about his Players and concerned about doing his all to stand up for their Rights,Your friendly Durhamite DUKE Crazey wish`s you the best !