Flu season has hit us all very hard this winter, and Krzyzewskiville on the campus of Duke University was no exception. The tent city of Duke students, images of which evoke the Hooverville shanty towns of The Great Depression, was closed down the very first week of February due to one of the worst flu seasons in recent memory.
Krzyzewskiville may resemble a homeless community upon first glance, but it’s populated entirely by students attending a school that costs $53,744 a year, with a $72,710 estimated cost of attendance. The tent community, which has WiFi and a highly regulated, heavily monitored set of rules, is definitely “roughing it” by design.
No space heaters are allowed in the zone that exists simply to gain student seating to the biggest of the big Duke basketball games. It’s a decades long tradition, and a genuine meritocracy in its truest sense. It’s also a group of kids getting ready for the biggest moment of the entire school year in just a matter of hours. Taking part in this tradition, no matter what it seems like to you or me, is a bucket list activity for every Cameron Crazie.
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If we, or someone we loved weren’t directly hit by influenza in the winter of 2017-18, we all went out of our way to prepare for it.
Surgical masks, hand washing, sanitizers, crowd avoidance- that was our life this winter, and for these students the spoils will arrive Saturday when #5 Duke welcome #9 North Carolina to the next installment of the greatest rivalry in sports.
It’s a chance for coach Mike Krzyzewski’s Blue Devils squad to avenge a 82-78 road-game loss on Feb. 8 to the Tar Heels.
Carolina comes in on the Heels (pun intended) of a loss in what was perhaps the greatest regular season game in memory. Roy Williams’ crew will no doubt be looking to run the ship after an emotional loss on Senior Night. It’s going to be a massive contest for Duke fans, Carolina fans, neutrals and non-college basketball fans alike.
This game is so massive that it’s the perfect example of how there is college basketball in the state of North Carolina, and there’s college hoops in the rest of the country.
It’s also the biggest night of the year for Krzyzewskiville, the moment that they have been waiting for for months.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes regularly to WGN CLTV and the Tribune company’s blogging community Chicago Now.
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