A Great Hypothetical Matchup: Duke 2001 vs UConn 2024

Over at CBS Sports, they do a feature every summer called Candid Coaches. The idea is they ask questions anonymously and the coaches, secure in their anonymity, speak freely.

The most recent question is: what was the best team so far of the 21st century? The top two vote-getters? 2023-24 UConn, with 17%, and 2000-01 Duke with 14% (the defending national champion, Michigan also got 14%).

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Which leads to an interesting, if obvious question: who would win between Duke and UConn?

UConn was a very, very good team, of course, and here are the starters for that winning group:

And for Duke in the 2001 title game:

First thing a lot of people are going to say is: where’s Boozer?

The first Boozer at Duke, Carlos, got hurt on February 27, 2001, against Maryland, breaking the third metatarsal in his right foot. He missed six games, returning for the Sweet Sixteen win over UCLA.

He still got starter minutes, but he came off the bench for the rest of the season.

Against that UConn team, that could have been a problem. Donovan is immense, and Sanders might have struggled against him. Boozer would do better, but he’s still five inches shorter than Donovan.

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Otherwise, though? Duke would be in good shape.

We’d give Dunleavy the advantage over Karaban on both ends. Battier and Castle might be a wash, but in college, Battier was an incredible leader, so we’d take him there.

We’re honestly not sure about the other individual matchups, and because it’s a team game, it only matters in retrospect, and that’s entirely hypothetical.

But there are a couple of reasons why we’d pick Duke. First, this team arguably got better when Boozer was out. Second, Duke had Nate James and Reggie Love in reserve. Third, and most importantly, Duke had Williams. People tend to forget how great he was, but Williams was a stunning athlete before his career-ending accident with the Chicago Bulls, and there was no real way to stop him. He did what he wanted on the basketball court.

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None of that…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/great-hypothetical-matchup-duke-2001-112000235.html

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Publish date : 2026-09-03 11:20:00

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