Duke Roundball Notebook: NCAA Tournament Edition

March Madness officially got underway on Sunday when the 2012 NCAA Championship Bracket was announced. With a 27-6 overall record, Duke grabbed the No. 2 seed in the South Region and will face No. 15 seed and Patriot League Champion Lehigh in the second round on Friday, March 16, at 7:15 p.m. in Greensboro, N.C. Duke will have quite a challenging path to the National Championship game in a region that features six teams in the RPI Top-20 including overall No. 1 seed Kentucky, No. 3 seed Baylor, No. 4 seed Baylor, No. 5 seed Wichita State and No. 6 seed UNLV.

Duke will be well-prepared for the competition, however, as 15 of the Blue Devils' 33 games this season were against NCAA Tournament-bound teams. Duke went 10-5 in those games and had the third toughest schedule in the country according to the ESPN Strength of Schedule. Among Duke's wins were victories over two NCAA No. 1 seeds, Michigan State on a neutral court and North Carolina on the road.

The Blue Devils are at their best when the NCAA Tournament begins, having amassed a 79-23 (.775) record under Coach K in the tournament. No coach in NCAA history has won more NCAA Tournament games than Coach K, and few teams will be as prepared to handle college basketball's biggest stage as the Blue Devils.

NCAA TOURNAMENT NOTES

Duke is 96-31 (.756) all-time in the NCAA Tournament, ranked as the highest NCAA Tournament winning percentage of any program. Duke's 96 wins are the third most behind Kentucky (105) and North Carolina (105).
Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski is 79-23 (.775) in the NCAA Tournament and is college basketball's all-time leader in NCAA Tournament wins. North Carolina's Roy Williams is the next closest active coach with 58 NCAA wins.
For the 14^th time in the last 16 years, Duke received a top-eight national NCAA seed.
Duke has been seeded No. 1 13 times, the second most in NCAA history.
As the No. 2 seed in the tournament, Duke owns a 23-7 record. Duke won the 1991 NCAA Championship as the No. 2 seed.
Duke is 12-0 when playing NCAA Tournament games in Greensboro, N.C. Duke won the 2001 NCAA Championship after playing its first two games in Greensboro.
Duke has beaten a No. 1 seed eight times, the most No. 1 upsets in NCAA history.
Duke's 17 consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances (including 2012) ranks as the second longest active streak in the NCAA. Only Kansas, with an active 23-year streak, has made the tournament in more consecutive seasons.
The Blue Devils have advanced to 35 NCAA Tournaments, 26 Sweet Sixteens, 18 Elite Eights, 15 Final Fours and 10 National Championship Games.
As former Blue Devil Shane Battier (@ShaneBattier) points out on Twitter, Duke and Kentucky could potentially meet in the Final Four in a 20-year anniversary matchup of "The Shot" and one of the greatest games in college basketball history.
Duke has played Kentucky, Connecticut and Kansas five times each in the NCAA Tournament. Those three NCAA Tournament series are tied for the fourth most played in tournament history.
From 1991-93, the Blue Devils won 13 consecutive NCAA Tournament games which ranks as the second longest streak in NCAA history behind only John Wooden's 38-game run at UCLA from 1964-74.

COACH K, DUKE PLAYERS TO ADDRESS MEDIA TUESDAY
Coach K and select Duke players will take time to speak with the media on Tuesday about the NCAA Tournament, their seeding and the team's mindset entering the tournament. Fans can watch the press conference live on GoDuke.com by clicking the "Video" tab on the homepage.

COACH K'S LEHIGH CONNECTION
Coach K stands atop the NCAA's all-time wins list in college basketball with 927 career victories, setting the record with his 903rd win this year over Michigan State on Nov. 15, but his 37-year journey to becoming the winningest coach in college basketball did not take off until Nov. 28, 1975. On that day, a 27-year-old Krzyzewski in his first season as Army's head coach led his West Point squad to a 56-29 victory over Lehigh for his first career win. Krzyzewski's first team went just 11-14 that year, but just five years later, he found himself standing on Duke's sidelines for the 1980-81 season.

ON THE LEHIGH MOUNTAIN HAWKS
Lehigh earned an automatic NCAA bid as the Patriot League Champion and enters the NCAA Tournament on an eight-game winning streak. Duke will not be the first upper-tier team the Mountain Hawks (26-7) have faced this year as they hung tight with NCAA Tournament teams Michigan State (a 90-81 loss) and Iowa State (an 86-77 loss) and also with a talented St. John's team (a 78-73 loss), all on the road. Lehigh's roster boasts the nation's fifth leading scorer in junior C.J. McCollum (21.9 ppg.), a versatile guard who also averages 3.6 assists and 2.6 steals per game. The NCAA bid will be the fifth for Lehigh, which also advanced to the Big Dance in 2010.

AMAKER LEADS HARVARD TO NCAA BID
The Harvard Crimson, now in its fifth season under head coach and former Blue Devil Tommy Amaker, captured the second NCAA Tournament bid in school history. The Crimson won a school-record 26 games this year to secure the Ivy League Championship and will face No. 5-seed Vanderbilt in the second round.

AWARDS FOR RIVERS KEEP COMING
Austin Rivers had quite a day last Tuesday when in a 12-hour span he was named the ACC Rookie of the Year, a Freshman All-American, a finalist for the Wooden Award and to the USBWA All-District Team. And just one day earlier, Rivers learned that he had become only the seventh freshman in ACC history to earn a spot on the All-ACC first team. Also a nine-time winner of the ACC Rookie of the Week award, Rivers could also earn the distinction as only the third freshman in Duke history to lead the team in scoring if he keeps up his 15.3 points-per-game average in the NCAA Tournament.

LANCE THOMAS SCORES CAREER-HIGH 18 POINTS FOR NEW ORLEANS
Former Duke NCAA Champion Lance Thomas, who spent 19 games in the NBA Development League this year, exploded for 18 points off the bench for the New Orleans Hornets on Friday. Thomas played a career-high 30 minutes against Denver and sank 12-of-14 free throws on the way to his 18 points. Thomas, who made New Orleans' opening-day roster but was waived after just three games, has only gotten better since the Hornets re-signed him in early February. The 6-8 forward is averaging 7.5 points and 3.7 rebounds per game in six March games and averages 18:11 minutes per game during that span.

LINKED IN
Amaker has finally found a home at Harvard (Washington Post)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/colleges/tommy-amaker-has-finally-found-a-home-at-harvard/2012/03/02/gIQA2KRYpR_story.html

Kenny Dennard's comments on being named to 2012 ACC Legends Class (Bradenton Herald)
http://www.bradenton.com/2012/03/10/3930455/dukes-kenny-dennard-comments-on.html

More to Duke's Thornton than meets the eye? (Raleigh News & Observer)
http://www.newsobserver.com/2012/03/08/1913790/more-to-dukes-thornton-than-meets.html

Dependable Mason Plumlee proves valuable for Duke (Fayetteville Observer)
http://www.fayobserver.com/articles/2012/03/10/1163153?sac=fo.sports

Suns' Grant Hill's defense holding opponents in check (AZCentral.com)
http://www.azcentral.com/sports/suns/articles/2012/03/04/20120304phoenix-suns-grant-hill-defense.html

TWEETS OF THE WEEK
@JayBilas Jay Bilas
Terrific documentary on 1992 NCAA Champs produced by @realgranthill33, Christian Laettner: bit.ly/ywZp2E That team was well coached.

@KyleSingler Kyle Singler ‏
Conference tourney time! #marchmadness begins. This moment w/ @ndotsmitty is one I will never forget. twitpic.com/8tolsz

@butley18 Brandon Utley
Duke has made 121 more 3-point field goals than its opponents this season, only Wisconsin (+135) has a better differential. #LetsGoDuke

@OGxScotty B Sir Scott
Just finished my bracket. Duke-Syracuse for the national title.

@rearranged44 Jay Smith
What an amazing documentary! Wow. Duke basketball....there's nothing like it! #DukeNation

@BobbyHurley11 Bobby Hurley
B Hurley Final 4- Syracuse, Kansas, Florida, Duke. Fire bracket questions if u wish but buyer beware I'm coming off a sub par 2011!

@JJRedick JJ Redick ‏
Shout out to @slangmagic for a career high 18 pts last night for the NO Hornets. #dukeinthenba Way to go LT!