Duke Shows Why Its Ranked No. 1 In 84-37 NCAA Tournament Win

March 14, 2002

GREENVILLE, SC–Only nine seconds had ticked off the game clock at the Bi-Lo Center when senior forward Greg Lewis put Winthrop ahead of No. 1 ranked Duke in the first round of the NCAA Championship Tournament Thursday night, but that would be the only lead the Eagles would enjoy as the Blue Devils scored easily and often to take a 52-15 halftime lead before settling for a 84-37 victory.

Duke improves to 30-3 and will face Notre Dame and former Blue Devil assistant coach Mike Brey in Saturday’s second round game. The winner will advance to the South Regional at Rupp Arena in Lexington, KY.

Duke shot a blistering 67 percent (21-33) in the first half and finished the game with 60 percent shooting (32-53) to roll past the four-time Big South Conference champions. Carlos Boozer, Mike Dunleavy and Jason Williams combined to score 45 of Duke’s 52 first half points. Boozer and Williams finished the game with 19 each while Dunleavy scored 18.

"Obviously we ran into a great team tonight," said Winthrop head coach Gregg Marshall. "Duke took us out of what we wanted to do, and you have to credit them. If we played them 100 times, we might beat them once."

Winthrop was ice cold in the first half as the Eagles connected on just 20 percent (6-30) before finishing the game at 28 percent (16-57). Winthrop also hurt itself by committing 15 of its 20 turnovers in the first half.

Lewis closed out his collegiate career by scoring 15 points and grabbing 7 rebounds. He was the only Eagle in double figures. Pierre Wooten added eight points for Winthrop which finished its season with a 19-12 record.

Duke built a 40-point margin in the second half at 63-23 on a 3-pointer by Williams before Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski went to his bench over the last 14 minutes of the game.

Krzyzewski had comforting words for the Winthrop following the game. "You can tell why Winthrop is a four-time champion in their league. They played really hard and came at us very strong. We knew that and we were ready. We came at them the same way. We just have more manpower than they do."