SHOCK TREATMENT
BUFFALO – As far as Eric Maynor was concerned, the other nine players on the floor could have been invisible. The 18,843 people in the stands could have been gathered around a TV screen at the Anchor Bar across town, wolfing down chicken wings and HSBC Arena as sterile as an ER. Didn’t matter to him.
“What I knew,” the sophomore guard would say later, “was that I wanted a chance to win this game. I wanted the ball in my hand.”
What he knew was that Duke’s DeMarcus Nelson had just tied this NCAA Tournament West Region game at 77 with a driving lay-up with just over 10 seconds to play.
Maynor’s Virginia Commonwealth team had been coming back at the Blue Devils all night, from 13 points down in the first half, from 11 down with 10½ minutes left in the game.
“This was our shot,” Maynor said. “This was our game.”
He hoped VCU coach Anthony Grant wouldn’t call timeout. He didn’t. He hoped Duke wouldn’t double-team him, force him to give up the ball. It didn’t. He’d already made back-to-back drives on the Blue Devils, giving the Rams short-lived, two-point leads.
Now, it looked as if he was going to do the same thing again. Only he didn’t; he pulled back, just past the top of the key. He flicked his wrist.
And he knew.
When it fell through the basket, it gave VCU a 79-77 lead with 1.8 seconds left; when Greg Paulus’ desperate heave caromed away (since Duke-section spectator and Buffalo native Christian Laettner apparently couldn’t get dressed in time to try to reprise his famous catch-and-shoot), it was a 79-77 win.
“They played hard for 40 minutes and so did we,” a red-eyed Mike Krzyzewski said. “They were just a little bit better team than us tonight.”
Duke and VCU couldn’t have entered the game from more different strata. VCU hadn’t won an NCAA game since 1985; Duke hadn’t missed a Sweet 16 since 1996.
And thanks to Paulus (career high 25 points) and Josh McRoberts (career-high 22, with 12 rebounds) Duke looked primed to blow the Rams off the court.
Only it didn’t happen that way. Maynor, who keyed a miraculous last-minute comeback over George Mason last week in the Colonial tournament final, wouldn’t let it happen that way. He had 22 points, eight assists and refused to give an inch. Neither team would in a bruising battle that saw 45 personal fouls and rivers of spilled blood.
“Just the spirit of the game,” Paulus said. “Two teams who want the same thing.”
The result wasn’t without irony. This VCU team was built by Jeff Capel, a former Duke player whom Krzyzewski had pushed hard for that job at age 27. When Capel left for Oklahoma last spring, Grant arrived from Billy Donovan’s Florida staff to find a team eager and ready to win, ready for its moment.
Last night, together, they found it.
WEST REGION VCU 79 Duke 77
Butler 57, ODU 46
Pete Campbell was out of his zone. He found it in the nick of time.
After missing all three of his shots in the first half yesterday, Campbell found his range midway through the second, hitting three 3-pointers to spark a 17-0 run and help Butler, the No. 5 seed in the Midwest, beat Old Dominion 57-46 in a first-round NCAA matchup between mid-majors.
AP
