Advertisement

The Magic of Zion: People have stopped hating Duke (for now)

Pete Thamel

WASHINGTON, D.C. – He’s been compared to the Incredible Hulk, hyped like LeBron James and emerged as a one-man economic stimulus package, like a Santa Claus for scalpers.

Zion Williamson’s lone season at Duke University has been unlike anything college basketball has experienced this generation. His shoe exploding turned into a cultural touchstone and briefly tanked Nike stock. His YouTube numbers pinballed into the millions before he even reached campus. He’s captivated everyone from President Obama to Jay-Z to a flurry of NBA stars advising him to sit out to preserve his draft status.

With No. 1 Duke having escaped No. 4 Virginia Tech, 75-73, and headed to a high-wattage Elite Eight matchup against No. 2 Michigan State, Zion’s most impressive college basketball accomplishment transcends what he’s done on the floor.

As he’s dunked his way into America’s heart, Williamson has also altered the perception of Duke. Perhaps temporarily, but certainly distinctly. Duke has long been America’s most loathed team, often watched only with hopes of seeing them lose. But with Williamson’s college basketball career having just 120 possible minutes remaining, it’s clear this Duke team has taken on a much different tenor publicly.

Now, it would be an overstatement to say that suddenly everyone loves Duke. But the image of two powder-blue-clad North Carolina fans celebrating Zion’s opening dunk at the ACC tournament against Syracuse offers proof that this Duke season has been different than any other. “Magical,” said Duke athletic director Kevin White. “It’s been magical. Everything around it has been magical.”

The magic moment against Virginia Tech on Friday night came with around 10:30 remaining in the second half. Williamson converted an alley-oop pass from Tre Jones that less than 10 humans on Earth could have turned into a dunk. To quantify the moment requires multiple viewings, which is convenient as it will be embedded in CBS highlight-reel perpetuity. The Tao of Zion is his ability to do something like that nearly every game, winking at the rim from eye level while punishing it with blunt force.

He delivered a similar gem on the defensive end, recovering from getting crossed over by Virginia Tech point guard Justin Robinson to volleyball spike his shot off the backboard. Zion finished with 23 points on 11-of-14 shooting, and also managed to deliver his typical ensemble of jaw drops and roof escalations.

It’s the waiting, wondering and wanting for moments like that that have helped Duke perhaps reach unprecedented levels of attention and significantly less of the typical vitriol that’s accompanied Duke in the past. (Zion alone has nearly 3 million Instagram followers, which means roughly the population of Chicago is tracking his every post.)

Missing from this season were the litany of media stories about how unpopular Duke players are. A simple search of hated players at Duke reveals headlines like this: “Mount Rushmore of hated Duke Players,” from the Washington Post. (Laettner, Battier, Allen and Redick, if you don’t feel like clicking. Somewhere, Wojo is slapping the floor feeling like he was robbed.) And there’s many more, as hating Duke has become so sheik that it’s prompted its own clickbait industry. (Here are the 20 most hated Duke player of all-time, for example.)

But for this season, that type of predictable trope has disappeared. It’s as if Zion has negotiated a temporary truce on Duke hating, a shift so jarring that it’s like Red Sox and Yankee fans spooning in the bleachers at Fenway Park.

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski wouldn’t say he’s noticed a tenor switch, but did say that he’s appreciated Duke is popular enough to be considered divisive.

“I'm just glad that people are attentive to what we do,” he said. “And if they're attentive to what we do, it must be that we're pretty good at doing it. But this group is a group that can be liked by a lot — if you like basketball, you should like these kids. Whether you like me or not, that's another question.”

When Virginia Tech’s Ahmed Hill missed a bunny lob at the rim at the buzzer that would have tied the game, Duke survived for the second consecutive game when a point-blank shot somehow missed. The segment rejoicing the most were the ticket scalpers. In the earlier game here, LSU fans in the most expensive seats in the lower bowl were greeted by ticket scalpers with wads of hundred dollar bills to buy their tickets. It’s common for losing teams at NCAA sites to sell their tickets, but this was different. Men were frantically waving wads of cash to anyone wearing purple, and they were lined at least seven deep at the tunnel near Section 111.

Such is the allure of Zion, who is his own cottage industry in the ticket market.

“It’s endless,” White said. “We can’t meet the ticket demand. The level of interest is at a fever pitch. We’ve just not been able to respond to the level of ridiculously keen interest.”

The level will return for the epic clash with Michigan State on Sunday, as CBS got the blue-blood matchup of Hall of Fame coaches and brand-name programs. And while America would normally root for Izzo, you can’t help think that there will be a lot more folks than the ticket scalpers rooting for Zion to make it to Minneapolis.

More from Yahoo Sports: