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Back in the media room at Cameron, waiting for Duke players to finish up practice and come in to answer the question.

I had to make a quick trip down to Atlanta last Thursday to cover the Wake-Georgia Tech game, filling in a hole like a young Tim Flannery. Since it was a trip made on short notice, I did it on the cheap.

How did it turn out? Let me tell you this. If by chance, a friend suggests you take a trip down to the Dirty South and suggests that you grab a room at the Days Inn Airport ... run. Very fast. And don't turn around. The final scorecard on the room - one lamp out of three that worked, a bathtub that wouldn't drain, one towel and a kleenex holder that had been ripped out the wall.

Nonetheless, this intrepid reporter made it back home on Friday and then headed out to the Va Tech-Duke game on Sunday night. That's when things got interesting. As I was writing my story on deadline, I couldn't figure out where all of my audio files had gone on my digital recorder. I didn't have much to think about it though, and managed to finesse the article.

It wasn't until today, then, as I was trying to transfer audio files to my computer that I realized how horribly wrong things had gone. Two minutes into listening to an interview with the Longwood women's basketball coach that I was pretty sure I hadn't conducted, I realized that my beloved Olympus 240PC had been ... kidnapped? recordernapped?

Fortunately my reporter skills kicked in and I managed to track my recorder to a reporter at the Lynchburg News & Advance. Somehow we picked up each other's Olympus during the frenetic post-game interview fray. My baby should be on its way home, via the U.S. mail.

Four SoCon (that's shorthand for the Southern Conference for the uninitiated) teams have been invited to play in the Bracket Buster event on Feb. 19. The Bracket Buster is a recent development in which top mid-major programs get to meet in the late season, to provide them a little bit of pub and perhaps an RPI boost they won't get from playing in-conference games.

So the four SoCon schools were: Chattanooga (6-3, 13-6), check; Georgia Southern (6-3, 13-8), check; College of Charlesto (6-3, 13-6) check; and ... ETSU?

The ETSU that is currently 2-7 in the SoCon and 6-13 overall? Apparently so.

Maybe I'm missing something. Maybe ETSU gets an automatic invite because the Bucs were conference champs the last two seasons. But if that's not the case, then someone please clue me in.

UNCG wouldn't be able to play anyway, because the Spartans have a game against App State on that day. But what about, oh, say, Davidson? The Wildcats are 10-0 in conference and own a non-conference win at Missouri.

Maybe the Wildcats turned down an invite. That's certainly possible. Because the way I figure it, no SoCon team is in a position to get an at-large NCAA bid. So RPI boosts would only help position a team for an NIT bid. I'm guessing that Davidson would rather focus on winning the SoCon tournament instead.

Still, it seems a bit strange ...

I'm not making a prediction about tonight's game. No, I'm not getting gun-shy after blowing my two previous prognostications. I just spent a little bit of time recently thinking about what's happened in the ACC over the last few weeks.

Duke blew out Virginia Tech. The Hokies, of course, had just won at Georgia Tech. Georgia Tech, you may remember, beat Wake Forest. Wake, as we all know, beat UNC. UNC beat the stuffing out of Maryland. The Terps went into Cameron and beat Duke. They then beat Georgia Tech. But then, just when things were starting to make sense, Maryland got handled easily by Clemson. The Tigers had been beaten just before by N.C. State, which had lost at home to Florida State, which had lost at home to the Tigers but had also beaten Wake Forest.

See what I'm saying? You want me to make any sense out of this? Good luck.

North Carolina visits Duke next week, as every man, woman, child and domesticated animal between Bayboro and Boone is well aware. Cameron is dangerous territory for lightning-rod players who don't play for the home team. Which is to say J.J. Redick is treated well by the Crazies; Rashad McCants and Julius Hodge ... not so well.

So McCants probably didn't do himself any favors by making that throat-slash gesture on national TV in the second half of Thursday night's UNC win over N.C. State. As Roy Williams noted in the preseason, Duke students are sure to have a field day with his media-day "jail sentence" comments. Now this.

The message boards were pretty active Friday about where the gesture falls on the scale of poor taste. General consensus: not as offensive as Taron Downey's throat slash, but too offensive to be seen in public.

I won't enter that debate, but I will say this: It's hard to find the slightest shortcoming in the way the Tar Heels are playing right now, but at least three questions remain (I'm sure I'm forgetting something) when sizing them up as an NCAA-title contender:

1) Can they win in a tough road environment? 0-1 under those circumstances so far.
2) How will they handle a close finish? Smallest margin of victory so far is 7 points, at Indiana; lost by 11 and 13.
3) Will McCants have a meltdown? He's not as tightly wound as many seem to think, but he can be an unpredictable, at times combustible, personality. The Heels want him to remain unselfish, healthy and happy. And no more throat slashes.

N.C. State coach Herb Sendek hadn't gotten a lot of looks at Marvin Gaye Williams Jr.(his grandparents were big fans) before Thursday night's trip to the Dean Dome. The 6-9 freshman, and future lottery pick, impressed him with a 20-point, 5-rebound outing while recovering from the flu. And, no, Williams still hasn't started a college game.

"I didn't have a chance to watch him extensively in high school," Sendek said after UNC's 95-71 win, "but as everyone knows, there was a lot of speculation if he would even come to college -- and you can see why. He is just an awesome talent, he really is. I don't think there is anything he can't do. What is really eye-catching when you see him for the first time up close is how big he is."

Williams had already shown Tar Heel fans his ability to rise above the rim, though his vogue pose on one breakaway dunk Thursday was new to them. What he hadn't shown off much until UNC's trip to Virginia last weekend is his stroke from 3-point range.

He had five 3's before that rout, but is 6 of 7 over his last two games. He said following the State game that assistant coach Joe Holladay has implored him to look for his shot behind the arc.

They say he's a great listener. So there's your proof.

Where assigned media seating has returned. Good times.

I'm eager to see the point guard matchup in this one. Jarret Jack is quite possibly my favorite player in the ACC. Every game in which I've seen him play he seems just desperate to get a win. I watched him beat UNC on a buzzer beater at the ACC tourney last year and help shut down Chris Paul earlier this season. Oh, and I watched him shred Duke with his penetration in Tech's upset of Duke last season at Cameron.

Which brings me to today. In the pre-season everyone was fretting about how Duke would handle playing in an ACC full of elite PGs when they're own PG, Daniel Ewing, was playing his first season at the position. We all sort of forgot about that concern while Duke was starting 15-0. But now, the Blue Devils have faced two elite points, John Gilchrist and Chris Paul, and are now 0-2. That's not enough data yet to form a conclusion, but if Duke goes down against Jack and the Jackets (sounds like the name for a 50's do-wop group doesn't it?) then I think the Devils have cause for concern.

ONe other aside -- watched episodes 2 and 3 of Tilt on Thursday night. I'm not going to hide it any more. I like the show. And Michael Madsen is still one of my favorite tough-guy actors. I still can't believe he did the narration for Animal Precint on Animal Planet.

Sports writers, especially those who vote on Heisman Awards and national players of the year, get some of the strangest things in the mail. Rob Daniels still has his Byron Leftwich bobblehead doll sent by Marshall a few years back. I recently received my Bogut boomerang courtesy of the University of Utah sports publicity office, complete with Australian Andrew Bogut's impressive stats.

Check out this Mike DeCourcy "Daily Dish" on what happened, or didn't happen, when he threw his boomerang in the garbage can. He offers an excellent explanation of why nobody sees Bogut play nor cares how impressive his stats are. Sunday, DeCourcy wrote that the Duke game is important for UNC because the Heels could use a quality RPI road win, much as I'd blogged over the weekend.

Honest, I swear.

I didn't get a chance post this rant earlier today, and fortunately my boy John Clayton at ESPN has already put my frustrations into words.

What horrendous clock management by the Eagles!

Fortunately, I was only mildly pulling for the Eagles, since my allegiances in pro football lie well below the Mason-Dixon line. But if I was an true-green Eagles fan I would have been throwing my salsa and nachos at the tv during the end of the first half, when Philly leisurely let the clock run out instead of frantically trying to move into field goal range. And I would have done far worse during that "six-minute" drill as Bill Simmons aptly dubbed it. Philly takes over with 5:45 or so remaining, still needing two scores. They make it down the field for a TD but take their own sweet time doing so, letting 4 minutes - FOUR MINUTES! - tick off the clock. They went with a huddle after every single freaking play!

Worse, here's Philly coach Andy Reid's explanation:

On the first half slow-poke routine:
"I don't remember that at all, to be honest with you," Reid said.

On the end of the game slothlike activity.
"Well, we were trying to hurry up," Reid said. "It was the way things worked out."

Wha? Huh? Those answers made me question Reid even more. A critical lost opportunity to get three points - and reverse momentum - before the half and he DOESN'T REMEMBER?

Then that second gem. Uh we were trying to hurry up, but, well, we didn't. What, was he physically incapable of telling his team to go to a no-huddle offense?

If he'd said something half-rational like "We needed to take our time on those drives because the Patriots D was so complex." I might have bought it. Instead, I'm left to think that Reid just didn't cut it in the clutch.

But hey, at least the Eagles covered the spread, right?

Here's an interesting piece, by ESPN.com's Chad Ford, on which underclassmen are likely to declare for the NBA draft. You can read the article as long as you're an ESPN Insider subscriber.

Ford's sort of the draft expert for ESPN, the guy who scours Europe and checks in with all the scouts and GMS. If his info is solid, then Duke and UNC fans can breath a little easier.

Duke fans I know have already started wondering if Shelden Williams and J.J. Redick will make the leap to the NBA and skip their senior seasons. Ford lists eight players likely to declare and 26 underclassmen who are sitting on the fence. Shelden Williams doesn't appear until No. 17 in the second group, which does seem to be put in some sort of order by Ford. That would make him No. 25, not including seniors and foreign players. According to Ford, Williams "doesn't have a lot of buzz."

Redick, meanwhile, isn't even among the 46 players listed.

As for UNC fans, they're fretting about McCants, Felton, May and Marvin Williams early, in addition to saying goodbye to seniors Jawad Williams, Jackie Manual and Melvin Scott.

Ford lists Felton as likely to declare and slots him in the first half of the first round. That doesn't bode well for the draft. But he seems to think that Marvin Williams who has scouts salivating, may well stay around for another year.

McCants has the talent, according to Ford's sources, but there are still questions about his attitude. That's why he's listed as going in the second half of the first round. The irony for Heels fans - if McCants plays a big role in March, that might change the opinions of scouts and thus seal his departure.

May, meanwhile, isn't listed until No. 25 of the on-the-fence group. In other words, a first-round selection doesn't seem likely.

So based on that, perhaps Duke only loses Daniel Ewing this season and UNC perhaps gets two of its four underclassmen back. If that's the case, then both should be national title contenders in 2006.

Well, there's a new spin on the Eagles' perceived clock mismanagement, or at least very, very casual management, in the latter stages of Sunday's Super Bowl.

If Eagles center Hank Fraley's testimony is to be believed -- see this New York Times story (subscription required) -- QB Donovan McNabb was puking in the huddle and unable to audibly spit out the play calls (sorry, that was in poor taste) on those final two drives. Again, we'll have to see how this plays out, but McNabb could go from Super Bowl goat to valiant warrior in a South Philly Minute. Jim Young and John Clayton might even have to offer retractions.

There's no need for a retraction from Steve Smith, the irascible Panthers receiver, who let Freddie Mitchell have it last week on a radio show for daring to insult the Patriots' secondary. Mitchell, an Eagles receiver with a haircut straight out of "The Road Warrior," said he'd have something special for No. 37, known to the rest of the world as safety Rodney Harrison. Harrison caught two McNabb passes in the Super Bowl; Mitchell caught just one for 11 yards.

"He's not a premier receiver," Smith said on the James Brown Show. "My son in flag football had 22 catches. That's the level he's on."

We illustrated graphically the ebbs and flows of the Duke-North Carolina basketball rivalry in Tuesday's paper all the way back to 1920. One amazing note, courtesy of the UNC sports information office, that we failed to include in our coverage leading into tonight's game at Cameron Indoor: Duke has had a higher AP ranking than UNC in the teams' last 21 meetings.

My first thought was: Wait. Doherty had these guys up to No.1 for a couple of weeks in 2000-01. Well, the Heels were ranked No. 4 when they beat No. 2 Duke 85-83 on Feb. 1 that season, helping propel them to the top. And they were back down to No. 4 -- after losses to Clemson and Virginia -- when they faced No. 2 Duke again on March 4, a 95-81 Blue Devils win. It was pretty much downhill from there for Doherty.

UNC coach Roy Williams, who befriended Duke's Mike Krzyzewski through their work together on the NABC board of directors, is more than willing to admit Duke's owned the Heels lately (14 of the last 16).

"There's a saying that goes, 'As a coach, you don't want to make everybody else's Christmas nice.' Mike has never been nice to anybody at Christmas, New Year's, Thanksgiving or Easter. I say that tongue in cheek, but with a heck of a lot of respect."

Just in case you didn't see this, take a look at this from the humor columnist at Duke. Nothing really much else to add here but ... Wow.

OK, so it might not have been on the level of the infamous "Heidi" game. But local CBS affiliate WFMY-2 did befuddle many viewers -- some in this office -- last night by breaking away from the Duke-North Carolina game the instant the clock hit 0:00. Never mind that Coach K wasn't even sure the 71-70 game was officially over when the station practically cut Billy Packer off in mid-sentence to switch to their 11 o'clock news.

I was covering the game, so didn't hear about this snafu/gaffe/case of questionable judgment until this morning. I can only hope that WFMY had one heck of a lead story to their news broadcast.

It is February, and as Colin Smith, a vice president for Raycom Sports, notes, that's sweeps month. So affiliates want to get to their local news as quickly as possible. Raycom and the stations who carry its basketball broadcasts have an unwritten agreement that if the game goes more than 10 or 15 minutes past the two-hour programming window, they can drop off as quickly as they feel necessary.

In this case, it was 15 minutes over when the game ended. So no replays of UNC's final possession: Did Felton blow a chance to drive to the basket? No postgame wrap-up or ACC scoreboard. And, at least in this market, no so-called terminal break, which means something to advertisers if not to most of us.

"We give them the ability to leave our telecast as quickly as possible without interfering with the integrity of the broadcast," Smith said.

You be the judge.

I'd planned on blogging about the tight relationship between UConn coach Jim Calhoun and UNC's Roy Williams, but I'll save that for tomorrow. Instead, I direct you to a story by Doug Doughty, esteemed UVa beat writer for the Roanoke Times, who has finally gotten Pete Gillen to explain his unusual philosophy on timeouts after 5 1/2 years of trying.

"Some legendary coach who shall remain nameless lent me 4,125 timeouts," said Gillen in a thinly-veiled reference to former North Carolina coach Dean Smith. "So, I have a few more left than most coaches. You are who you are and that's just our style."

Smith was fairly judicious with his timeouts. Perhaps in his honor, Pete only called two when the Heels visited Charlottesville last month. Or, perhaps, he knew the timeouts wouldn't help in a game the Cavs ended up losing by 36.

Yes, if you support the opinion of Mike Ogle in this piece on ESPN's Page 2 website.

In the interest of full disclosure Ogle reveals that he is a recent UNC grad. And maybe there's a little bit of that snarky, "what a bunch of geeks" attitude in there, but Ogle makes some relevant points.

Like this one -
"What does Jawad Williams care that they're wearing a clown's bowtie and sunglasses? More importantly, did he even notice?"

It's part of a recent trend I've noticed spreading throughout the Crazies in recent years. It's one thing to paint yourself blue and maybe put a hoop on your head. That's at least tangentially connected to school spirit. But what, exactly, does wearing a blazer and a fake afro have to do with Duke basketball? Here's Ogle's explanation. And be warned, Duke fans, it might sting.

"They're too in love with themselves."

Ouch.

Now, here's the other side of this. Older Duke fans have been complaining about the Crazies for years. It's the old "Back in my day" type of grousing that older people always do. So take some of this with a grain of salt.

And whether or not the stuff is clever may not really be that important - sorry Crazies. The most important thing is to be loud - and supportive. And this group still seems to have that, even if their creative juices might not flow like previous generations of Crazies.

But I can pass along one message from Duke alums to the current group of Crazies. Lose the cheer sheets. Former Dukies are horrified that something so staged and pre-planned has creeped into Cameron.

I was in Hartford over the weekend covering the UNC-UConn basketball game and have to admit I got a bit nostalgic for NHL hockey when I spied a few Whalers banners hanging from the Civic Center rafters and a framed picture of then-Whaler Ron Francis facing off against Mario Lemieux in the press workroom.

Then, this morning, I hear Hurricanes (formerly the Whalers) radio man Chuck Kaiton talking about tomorrow's anticipated announcement from NHL commish Gary Bettman that the 2004-05 season is to be canceled. What a sad state of affairs.

There's a chance Bettman will instead be announcing a very condensed 28-game schedule with playoffs as usual. The AP reports that players have consented to a salary cap (but not the $40 mil owners demand) while the owners are agreeable about not tying salaries to revenues. So maybe there will be an 11th-hour deal.

I'm somewhat of a hockey junkie -- even did a fantasy league last season -- but realize most of America won't give a flip if hockey goes away. And they won't be pining loudly for its return next year because the game will be forgotten. Which makes players and owners alike look like delusional fools. If they scrap the season, the NHL will only be viable in Canada from here on out. And nobody will be paying players $1.8 mil average salary when the CBC is the only TV deal the NHL has left.

Oh, and anyone out there know which three jerseys were retired by the Whalers? Hint: "Red light" Mike Liut isn't one of them.

Speaking of nostalgia, Savannah State closed out its basketball season last night at 0-28. That takes me back to Curtis Hunter's final season as N.C. A&T coach when I covered an Aggies team that started the year 0-25. They won at Norfolk State to end the streak before I had a chance to do a retrospective on the 1991-92 Prairie View team that was the last to go winless for an entire season.

Savannah State might be a cautionary tale for any Division II program that is making, or thinking about making, the jump to D-I. Like Winston-Salem State, the Tigers of Savannah would like to join the MEAC, A&T's league. Savannah State's athletics department operates on a $2 million budget. Successful MEAC programs are in the $6 mil-$9 mil range.

It's official. Gary Bettman announced today there will be no 2004-05 NHL season, making the NHL the first major North American pro sports league to cancel an entire season. If and when hockey returns, it won't be a major sport anymore. Not south of Detroit, anyway.

Of course, some of us will come back. I'm already thinking about how 19-year-old Alexander Ovechkin will be ready to lead a Washington Capitals renaissance by next season. I will hate myself for watching, though, if the NHL still has a TV deal when it returns.

What is it, exactly about State and Maryland this year? In both games, State has looked like a sure-fire NCAA team, while the Terps have looked flatter than a tortilla.

Which brings me to another question. How exactly did Maryland beat Duke twice this season? Why are they so good against the Blue Devils and so ordinary against the rest of the league?

Which leads to another question. Should we read anything into the fact that Duke has been swept this season by an otherwise underachieving Maryland team? Does the fact that Duke is 3-3 now after a 15-0 start mean anything?

That's what the ACC season has been like so far. Every time you think you have an answer, the questions keep changing.

Here's one thing I think I can conclude: It's a shame that State missed Tony Bethel for so much of this season. They seem like a tournamen-worthy squad with him in the lineup. Granted, truly gritty teams learn to play through injuries (see Duke, not Georgia Tech) but you have to wonder what might have been had Bethel not come down with every ailment in the book short of chronic gingivitis.

Having said that, all is not yet lost for the Pack. This win puts them at 5-7 in the conference. They've got very winnable games left against Virginia Tech and at Virginia. But to reach .500 in the conference, which I think they'll need given a lack of big non-conference wins, the Wolfies will need to beat either UNC or Wake Forest. Both are at home, but I still don't like State's odds.

Then again this is the ACC ...

As a few of you may know, I have a soft spot for my native South Carolina. Which is why I was ecstatic last night as I saw the Gamecocks beat Kentucky. It's a huge win for Dave Odom's boys, but I just have one complaint.

Why, why, why were the South Carolina fans chanting "Over-Rated!" as Kentucky as the clock wound down. Is there anyone else aside from me who thinks this is a moronic cheer?

Here's what you're basicaly saying with that cheer: "Hey, you guys just lost our guys, so you must not be nearly as good as you thought you were!"

You might as well chant "We're not very good, but hey we got lucky tonight!"

OK, this has been bugging me since last night, when the folks at the Dean Dome treated us to R.E.M.'s frenetic classic "It's the End of the World As We Know It (and I Feel Fine)" on '80s Retro Night.

There's one lyric in the song that has always stood out to UVa grads because it seems to be an obvious reference to their alma mater:

"Watch O'Neill crush rush, uh-oh, this means no beer Cavalier. Renegade steer clear!"

Colleague Rob Daniels tells me R.E.M. passed through Charlottesville some time in 1984-85 and threw in the lyric as a reference to then-president Robert O'Neill's ban on alcohol on campus, er, Grounds. That included fraternity houses.

That's consistent with what I'd been told years ago. But when I check lyrics Web sites, only one that I can find has that version. Nearly all others have this as the line:

"Watch your heel crush, crushed, uh-oh, this means no fear cavalier.
Renegade steer clear!"

What that's supposed to mean, I have no idea. It's not what I hear when the song, off the "Document" album, is played, so I'd never given it any thought.

Does anyone out there know the real deal on R.E.M.'s lyrics? Perhaps they did alternate versions. Perhaps UVa people twisted it to their own advantage. Or maybe it's like Jimi Hendrix's line, "Excuse me while I kiss the sky," which many hear as "kiss this guy."

Anyway, seemed appropriate to me they'd play this while the Cavaliers were in town. I suspect Norwood Teague, UNC's associate AD for marketing & promotions, had something to do with the song choice. He used to have the same job at Virginia.

Not all Retro Night tunes were so solid. The copy desk cut this from my "Sights and Sounds" note: The musical selections from the '80s ranged from the quirky to the catchy to the outstanding (see above) to the ridiculously bad ("Karma Chameleon" by Culture Club).

And who picked out the outfits for ESPN's Len Elmore and Mike Patrick? Don't remember any afros that big in the 80's or jackets that plaid (except maybe on Wimp Sanderson or Norm Sloan).

As some of you may already know, Al Featherston, the long-time ACC writer for the Herald-Sun, was unceremoniously kicked to the curb last month when new management came in and did some immediate cost-cutting.

But fortunately Al, the closest thing to a walking basketball encyclopedia that I know, is still writing. Here's a very thoughtful piece he wrote for the Duke Basketball report on trying to determine the true value of a great defensive player. Scroll down on the left side, then click on the link to Featherston for the Defense.

I expected to see a "Live from Cassell" blog from Jim on Thursday night, or Friday, at least. But since he probably had to tend to his young daughter, we'll let it slide.

So I'll second an observation UNC's David Noel made Friday. The Tar Heels were fortunate to get their trip to Blacksburg out of the way early this season, as in mid-December early.

At the time of UNC's 85-51 rout, Tech didn't have Coleman Collins or football tight end Jeff King in the lineup. That's a lot of muscle -- those two accounted for 22 rebounds and 21 points in the Hokies' 67-65 upset over Duke. Without them, the Hokies even lost to VMI in December. Clearly, they're a more confident team now, one that's in a four-way tie for fourth place at 6-6 in the ACC.

No doubt J.J. Redick has become a respectable player on the defensive end. But he was too often victimized by Carlos Dixon's quickness. Seems to be the type of matchup that does not favor Redick, who committed four fouls. In one night!

If Clemson is to do the unthinkable later today -- beat North Carolina for the first time ever in Chapel Hill -- it's best they don't think about that big 0-50 record, which dates back to a 50-20 UNC victory in 1926 when the Heels were called the White Phantoms and played in the Tin Can.

But, best not to think about such details today if you're the visitor. Call it ignoring your limitations.

That is contrary to Roy Williams' philosophy, which he bases on a great Clint Eastwood line in his favorite Dirty Harry movie, "Magnum Force."

He shared this philosophy with reporters a couple of weeks ago when asked how much freedom he gives point guard Raymond Felton on the floor. I thought I might save this for a later story, but when you read it, you'll agree it works better as a Roy Williams monologue than as a quote in a Felton feature. Plus, at least one local blog enthusiast has been pining for more blogosphere "access" to the people we cover, so for his sake, enjoy ...

RW: "The first Dirty Harry movie was about some weirdo, but the second one was about some bad cops, and the chief of police was also a bad cop. And 2 or 3 times throughout the course of the movie, Dirty Harry said, 'You have to know your limitations.'

"And at the end, the chief of police, who was a dirty cop, got a bomb put in Clint Eastwood's car. And Clint Eastwood started walking toward the car and the chief of police walked toward his car, smiled, got in his car and turned his ignition and it blew up because Clint Eastwood had put it in his car.

"Clint turned around and said, 'You've got to know your limitations.'

"And that's the way I coach basketball. I give them all the freedom they can have, but, by golly, they better be able to do what they attempt to do. We get them to understand their limitations and then give them all kinds of freedom."

I should point out, Roy does NOT put a bomb in their cars if they fail to understand their limitations.

I hope this entry satisfies Jeff Carlton. So sorry to disappoint him by not posting a "Live from Cassell" entry up in Blacksburg.

Speaking of which, that's a nasty little home venue the Hokies have up there. The perfect size, around 10,000 or so, with no real upper or lower level, just seats from the floor up to the rafters. Students all positioned on one end, just like at Wake. Lots and lots of noise. Hard to say if it rattled the Blue Devils, but the home court advantage definitely helped out the young Hokies, who used the crowd's energy to keep them in the game early in the second half before surging ahead at the end....

Folks keep asking me for my prediction tonight and I keep giving the same honest - albeit cowardly - response - "I have no idea."

Look, I've been so wrong so many times so far this ACC season that my predictions wouldn't have any credibility even if I did make them.

Here's what I will say - This is the most important game of the season for Duke. This is the point - I believe - where we start to draw some conclusions about the Blue Devils. Are they the team we thought they were at the beginning of the season, NCAA tournament bound, maybe Sweet 16, but a tier below Wake and UNC? A loss tonight would seem to confirm that.

Or is Duke still a group of overachievers, using its Big Three and the coaching wiles of Krzyzewski to turn itself into a national title contender? A win tonight would keep Duke alive for a top-two finish in the ACC and keep the Blue Devils in the same discussion as UNC and Wake Forest. Teams that are in that conversation can still be talking about reservations for St. Louis.

Maybe that's too simplistic, but it just seems like we've hit a dividing point here for Duke.

As for Wake, I'd still like to see them get a quality road win before I go ahead and pencil them in for St. Louis. As good as Deacons are, their most impressive road win might be at Miami.

The key tonight? I think it's Shelden Williams. He looked a bit lost against Virginia Tech on Wednesday, constantly ending his post moves underneath the backboard, forcing him to lean back into the court to put up his shot. As a result, he made only six of 13 shots from in close.

Also, in the first matchup, in Winston-Salem, Williams looked tentative from the start, so worried about avoiding foul trouble that it seemed as if he began the game with three fouls. As a result, Eric Williams had a very strong performance down low, particularly on the offensive boards.

Tonight, Williams - Shelden, that is - must play loose and agressive and get an outright win in his matchup with Eric Williams. Of course, he still has to do that while staying out of foul trouble. A tall order, to be sure. But hey, no one said beating Wake would be easy.

I think I speak for hundreds of thousands frustrated car drivers here when I say this ...

I just don't understand Atlanta traffic.

I was down here at the end of January for a 9 p.m. game between Wake and Tech. I left my hotel near the airport, south of the city, at around 6 p.m. I figured traffic wouldn't be a problem since I was headed into the city at the end of the day, pulling the old reverse commute.

Wrong. About 10 miles and two hours later I staggered into Alexander Memorial Coliseum for the game.

Fast forward to today. 7 p.m. game between Duke and GT. At another hotel near the airport (a moderate upgrade from my Day's Inn debacle, by the way). After my experience last time, I'm feeling pretty nervous when I can't set out for the airport until 4 p.m. If traffic into the city was horrible at 6 p.m., it's going to be doubly bad at 4 p.m. Right?

Wrong. Cruised through the city without a problem and ended up having to wait until the will-call booth actually opened.

So what, you might ask does this have to do with tonight's game? Easy. If you like similes, try this one: Georgia Tech is like Atlanta traffic. Impossible to figure out. Sometimes it's a breeze to face. Sometimes it's a tremendous headache.

Tonight? I think the Yellow Jackets will be a headache for the Blue Devils. It's B.J. Elder's fourth game back in the lineup, so he should be rounding into form. Plus, the Jackets know they got tremendously lucky in their win over FSU. Maybe that scared them straight. And Luke Schenscher - remember him? - actually had 12 second half points against the Seminoles. The last time he played consistently well Georgia Tech found itself in the national title game.

Am I predicting such greatness for the Jackets tonight? If you've read this blog recently you know I've dropped out of the prediction business after being unerringly wrong too many times in a row. I'll just say this - I wouldn't really consider it to be much of an upset if Tech pulls out the win tonight.

Apparently, when Duke's in town, the folks in the Tech department start getting last minute requests from the A-list for tickets to the big event.

Tonight, Jermaine Dupree - rap producer as well as Janet Jackson's man - is expected to be in the house.

Matthew McConaughey, fresh off appearances at Daytona and Braves spring training, was also originally planning to be here, but had to cancel at the last moment. Sorry ladies.

No word yet on Jack Nicholson and Dyan Cannon.

Yet another celebrity sighting, albeit not quite on the A-list.

Dickie V just walked into the press dining area with his buddy and fellow Sarasota resident Tom Neidenfuer, the former Dodgers relief pitcher. It was all we could do to keep N&O reporter Luciana Chavez, a Cali native and big Dodgers fan from throttling Neidenfuer and screaming "How could you give up those home runs to Ozzie Smith and Jack Clark in the '85 NCLS!"

Actually, she didn't take any drastic action, but told us that when she made eye contact with Neidenfuer, "he knew I knew"

All right, enough fun for now. Gotta cover a game.

Wallburg's Madison Hedgecock wasn't so much wowed by the Hula Bowl experience, or the hula girls, when he went to Maui last month to showcase his game for NFL scouts as he was by the celebs he saw while there.

If you catch my story in Friday's News & Record on Hedgecock's trip to the NFL Scouting Combine, you'll notice a passing reference to the "highlights" of his Hula Bowl voyage. Unfortunately, space limitations wouldn't allow me to digress and elaborate on his celebrity sightings in the newspaper.

But there are no such space restrictions in blog world, so for the curious, I'll elaborate here. Hedgecock, who played fullback at Ledford High and North Carolina, ran into beach volleyball star -- and swimsuit model -- Gabrielle Reece at the Maui airport baggage claim. He also saw Yankees manager Joe Torre (a good guy, even if you hate his employer as I do) and country singer Randy Travis, whose music Hedgecock said he enjoyed when he was in elementary school. He also added that Travis' wife is from Kernersville, but our fact-checkers haven't verified that claim yet.

It'll be interesting to see how far Hedgecock's blocking skills and all-around toughness can carry him in the NFL. Even if he's not drafted -- and he probably will be -- he can look to fellow Ledford grad Brad Hoover for inspiration. Hoover was undrafted but has become an invaluable member of the Carolina Panthers, as a ball-carrying and blocking fullback and as a big hitter on special teams.

Well, the obvious answer is yes. North Carolina just beat N.C. State the first time in three seasons that Rashad McCants wasn't in the lineup. If his mom's doubts hold up, the Tar Heels will have to win Sunday at Maryland without him because of what tests have shown to be an "intestinal virus." Clemson just won at College Park. But, with Maryland, who knows?

I'll be examining the adjustments UNC will have to make without McCants -- or with its star guard at less than full strength -- in the News & Record this weekend. Stay tuned. The school has been unusually silent when asked for health updates this week. But McCants' mother, Brenda Muckelvene, gave me a few insights this afternoon.

Here's the N&R note that may or may not be posted elsewhere online Friday:

McCANTS "DOING BETTER": The mother of Rashad McCants said she expects the North Carolina junior to miss his second straight game Sunday at Maryland because of an intestinal virus.

But, after speaking with him Thursday, Brenda Muckelvene is confident McCants is making significant progress.

"He will be fine as soon as he works it out of his system," she said. "He’s doing better."

McCants, who is the Tar Heels' top scorer (15.8 ppg), played sparingly Saturday against Clemson because of an upset stomach. He did not make the trip to N.C. State on Tuesday night. It was the first game McCants missed in his college career.

"He’s really been bothered by this since the night of the Duke game" Feb. 9, coach Roy Williams said after UNC's 81-71 victory over the Wolfpack. "So he's tried to fight through it."

Team trainer Marc Davis said in a statement released by the school Tuesday afternoon that doctors had no timetable for McCants' return. Muckelvene said Thursday she doubts he’ll play against the Terps.

"I don’t think he needs to rush," she said. "That's what happened last time."

It's been a week since Duke's win over Wake Forest and yet the talk about Mike Krzyzewski's decision to start walk-on guard Patrick Davidson continues.

At first we had a Rashamon-like debate over why Davidson was in the game. The Duke perspective - Davidson was inserted into the game to provide a spark to the benched regulars, by showing them what heart and hustle was like, first hand. The Wake Forest perspective - Davidson was put in the game as a bush league ploy to try to make Chris Paul angry and get him off his game. My perspective - Duke went into the game with the belief that Paul pushes off quite a bit when he's dribbling (he does, but so does almost every other guard in the ACC). So they put in Davidson to body him up, in the hopes of at leas proving a point, without picking up fouls on a more critical player, like Ewing or Dockery.

Just as that debate was settling down, the K-Davidson story got an additional boost when Temple coach John Chaney admitted he'd inserted a little-used reserve into a game against St. Joseph's to rough things up. That's when the radio waves started heating up and we started getting emails like this one - in which the writer equates Krzyzewski to Chaney, sending in goons into the game to rough up more talented players.

Here's what the emailer wrote:

"Weren't Coach K's practice players "goons"? If not, why not? Why was Coach K not as much at fault as Coach Chaney?"

I think this one's a bit of a stretch. The guy that Chaney put in the game weighed 250 pounds and actually broke the arm of a St. Joe's player with a hard foul. Patrick Davidson may weigh, oh, 170, and might be able to break an arm only if he was allowed to use an alumninum baseball bat in the process.

Look, I understand perhaps thinking that K violated the spirit of the game with the move. I know that's how Wake fans feel, certainly. But I don't think even Skip Prosser would argue that Chris Paul was in physical danger because of the hard, and somewhat clumsy, defense played by Davidson.

So that, to answer the emailer, is the difference between K and Chaney on this one.

Now, can we move on? We've got an ACC tourney coming up, you know.