2003-04

Season Overview

The 2003-04 season was a restoration year that became something far more dramatic. With 75.1% of minutes and 72.0% of scoring returning from the 2002-03 roster, plus the addition of five-star freshman Luol Deng — rated the #2 recruit in the nation behind only LeBron James — Duke had the pieces to compete for a championship again. The question was whether the young core could grow fast enough.

Chris Duhon returned for his senior year with a chip on his shoulder. After a disappointing junior season in which he’d been named ACC Preseason Player of the Year but shot just 27% from three and managed only Third Team All-ACC, he entered 2003-04 determined to prove his doubters wrong. He would deliver, running the point with the kind of poise and leadership that defined the best Duke teams. J.J. Redick and Shelden Williams, now sophomores, were beginning to scratch the surface of their extraordinary talent. Daniel Ewing provided steady two-way play at shooting guard. And Deng was everything advertised — a do-it-all wing who could post up, stretch defenses to twenty feet, and impact both ends of the floor. He averaged 15.1 points and 6.9 rebounds and was arguably the team’s most impactful player from day one.

Duke won the ACC regular season championship for the sixth time in eight years with a 13-3 conference record and rolled into the ACC Tournament as the #1 seed, looking for an unprecedented sixth consecutive tournament title. But the Blue Devils’ Achilles heel — rebounding — haunted them. Duke ranked 282nd nationally in defensive rebounding, a product of undersized lineups that featured Deng venturing away from the glass and perimeter-oriented wings in Redick and Ewing. Teams had a blueprint to beat Duke: pound the boards and force them to shoot from outside.

Two losses crystalized the vulnerability. On March 3, Georgia Tech came into Cameron Indoor Stadium and snapped the Blue Devils’ 41-game home winning streak, the longest active run in the nation, winning 76-68. Three days later, Duke hosted UNC for Senior Night — Duhon’s last game in Cameron — and won a tight, physical game with Deng scoring 25 points on 12-of-16 shooting off the bench, as K gave walk-on senior Nick Horvath the start. Redick dove on the floor for a crucial loose ball in the final minutes, a play K later called his biggest at Duke. Neither team led by more than six in the second half.

Then came the ACC Tournament championship game in Greensboro, and the dynasty finally cracked. Sixth-seeded Maryland, riding sophomore John Gilchrist’s scorching three-game run (he averaged 24 points, 6.3 assists, and 5.3 rebounds through the tournament), built an 11-point first-half lead before Duke stormed back to lead by 12 with under five minutes remaining. But Maryland closed regulation on a 15-3 run, with Gilchrist’s driving layup drawing Shelden Williams’ fifth foul and the ensuing free throw tying the game at 77 with 20 seconds left. In overtime, Duke went cold. Maryland won 95-87, ending the five-year championship streak and a 17-game ACC Tournament winning streak that dated to 1998. Gary Williams’ manic celebration on the ladder as the Greensboro crowd chanted his name was the image of the day. K was gracious in defeat: “My hat is off to Gary and his program. He’s a fighter and his teams won’t quit.”

Despite the tournament loss, Duke earned a #1 seed in the NCAA Tournament’s East Region for the sixth time in seven years. The Blue Devils were dominant through the first four rounds: Alabama State fell 96-61 (Shavlik Randolph led with 20 points), Seton Hall was dismantled 90-62 (Redick 21, Deng 20), and Illinois went down 72-62 as Duke’s guards disrupted the Illini’s rhythm. In the Elite Eight, a tense 66-63 win over Xavier clinched the Atlanta Regional title, with Deng earning regional MVP honors (19 points) and Shelden Williams anchoring the defense with 12 points, 13 rebounds, and 5 blocks.

The Final Four in San Antonio’s Alamodome brought Duke face-to-face with #2 seed UConn and its dominant center, Emeka Okafor. Duke built a 75-67 lead with four minutes remaining. Then UConn mounted one of the most devastating runs in Final Four history: 12 unanswered points. The decisive sequence was pure Okafor — he missed a shot that bounced around the rim, ripped the rebound out of Luol Deng’s hands, and laid it in to give UConn a 76-75 lead with 26 seconds left. “I just saw this orange object floating in the air, and it said ‘Grab me,’” Okafor said. Duke called timeout. Redick drove the lane but Okafor was waiting, disrupting the shot without a foul being called. Rashad Anderson hit two free throws to push the lead to three. Redick’s desperate three-pointer barely grazed the rim. Duhon banked in a 38-foot three at the buzzer, but it only cut the final margin to 79-78 — a meaningless basket that made the score look closer than the gut-punch felt.

Deng recorded a double-double with 16 points and 12 rebounds. Redick and Duhon each contributed. Ewing hit three buckets in the stretch run, including a three-pointer that gave Duke its 73-64 lead. But UConn held Duke scoreless over the final 4:36 of regulation (excluding Duhon’s buzzer bank), and Okafor was simply immovable. Deng later called it the most haunting loss of his career: “Till now, that’s the one loss that every time I think of losing, that’s the first thing that comes to mind.”

UConn went on to beat Georgia Tech for the national championship. Okafor was named tournament MOP. For Duke, the season ended at 31-6 — a record that ranked among the best in program history but fell one game short of the title game.

What happened next nearly tore the program apart.

Deng declared for the NBA Draft after his one season and was selected seventh overall by the Phoenix Suns (immediately traded to the Chicago Bulls). He would go on to play 15 NBA seasons, earn two All-Star selections, and become one of the most respected figures in global basketball.

But the real drama was Coach K. After the Lakers fired Phil Jackson following the 2004 NBA Finals loss to Detroit, Los Angeles offered Krzyzewski a five-year, $40 million contract with partial ownership of the franchise. Kobe Bryant personally called K to recruit him. K walked into a Duke gym and told players: “You’ll never guess who called. Kobe Bryant. He wants me to come coach him.” The negotiations went on for weeks. Redick, then a rising sophomore, began calling friends at other schools to explore transferring. “Coach was the primary reason I went to Duke,” Redick later said. “So I definitely called some friends at different schools. I was like, ‘Hey, do you guys have a spot? I might be transferring.’”

In July 2004, K announced he was staying. “Your heart has to be in whatever you lead,” he said. “It became apparent that this decision was somewhat easier to make because you have to follow your heart and lead with it, and Duke has always taken up my whole heart.” Twenty years later, K told ESPN that if the same offer came today, at 57, he would take it. But in 2004, he stayed — and the decision shaped the next two decades of college basketball. He would coach Redick through two more Player of the Year seasons, lead Duke to two more national championships in 2010 and 2015, and become the winningest coach in Division I history. Redick, whose Duke career was saved by K’s decision, would eventually become the head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers — the very team that had tried to take his coach away.

For three hours in San Antonio, the 2003-04 Duke Blue Devils looked like the team that would cap a remarkable season with a national championship appearance. They had survived a tense Elite Eight battle with Xavier. They had Luol Deng playing the best basketball of his one-year Duke career. Chris Duhon was orchestrating the offense with the calm of a fifth-year senior. And with four minutes remaining in the national semifinal, Duke held a 75-67 lead over second-seeded UConn.

Then the floor collapsed.

Daniel Ewing, who had been outstanding — hitting three straight buckets including a three-pointer that built the eight-point cushion — and the rest of the Blue Devils simply stopped scoring. UConn’s Emeka Okafor took over both ends of the court. He launched himself to swat a Deng shot, then hit a smooth 12-footer on the other end to cut the deficit to one. Ben Gordon, the Huskies’ brilliant guard, found seams in Duke’s suddenly porous defense. The lead evaporated.

The sequence that ended Duke’s season will live forever in Final Four lore. With 26 seconds remaining and Duke trailing 75-74, Okafor missed a shot. The ball bounced off the rim and hung in the air for what felt like a full second. Deng had position. He reached for the rebound. And Okafor, with the strength and reflexes that would make him the #2 pick in the NBA Draft five weeks later, simply ripped the ball from Deng’s hands — spun, saw the rim, and laid it in. UConn 76, Duke 75.

“I just saw this orange object floating in the air, and it said ‘Grab me,’” Okafor said afterward. “I grabbed it, spun, saw the rim, thought it would be a good idea to put it in, and that’s what I did.”

Duke called timeout. Redick drove the lane on the ensuing possession, looking for either a layup or a foul. Okafor was waiting. He got a hand on the ball without a whistle. UConn’s Rashad Anderson hit two free throws to push the lead to 78-75. Redick’s three-point attempt to tie barely grazed the rim. Okafor grabbed the rebound, hit a free throw, and it was 79-75. Duhon raced upcourt and banked in a 38-foot three-pointer as time expired — making the final score 79-78, a margin that suggested a close game. It was not a close game. Duke had been outscored 12-0 in the final four minutes and thirty-six seconds before Duhon’s meaningless heave.

Deng finished with 16 points and 12 rebounds. Ewing had been brilliant before the drought. Redick competed. But Duke could not overcome its season-long rebounding deficit against UConn’s physical frontline, and the final sequence — Okafor physically overpowering Deng for a rebound that should have been Duke’s — was the season’s fatal flaw distilled into a single play.

Deng called it the most haunting loss of his career. He later said on the Knuckleheads Podcast: “Till now, I tell people it’s the one loss that, you know, I’ve lost many times, but that’s the one loss that every time I think of losing, that’s the first thing that comes to mind.”

UConn went on to beat Georgia Tech 82-73 for the national championship. For Duke, the off-season brought a different kind of earthquake: Deng declared for the NBA Draft, and the Los Angeles Lakers offered K a five-year, $40 million contract to replace Phil Jackson. For one month in the summer of 2004, the future of Duke basketball — and of a sophomore named J.J. Redick — hung in the balance.