An oral history of Scheyer’s rivalry days as a player

By Max Rego

Associate Sports Editor

On Saturday, Duke and North Carolina need a win for similar reasons: To keep pace in the battle for a double bye in the ACC tournament, and to add to their respective NCAA tournament resumes.

But for the Blue Devils, offsetting the Tar Heels’ recent mojo in the series might be even more essential. After all, North Carolina not only won in the final home game for Mike Krzyzewski last March, it ended his career (and the thrilling Duke postseason run) in the Final Four in New Orleans last April. Plus, of the last five meetings between the two programs, last season’s commanding win in Chapel Hill represents the Blue Devils’ only victory.

The rivalry has not been quite this lopsided, in fact, since the mid-to-late 2000s, when the Tar Heels won six of seven against Duke— including four straight in Cameron Indoor Stadium, a feat only matched by Tim Duncan and Wake Forest in the 1990s. During those few years, North Carolina reached two Final Fours and won a national title in 2009, while Duke could only reach the Sweet 16 once during that span. But Krzyzewski would eventually capture his fourth national title in 2010, as the core of Jon Scheyer, Kyle Singler and Nolan Smith made their mark.

With Scheyer coaching in his first Duke-North Carolina game this weekend, a look back at his playing career, in the context of the rivalry, felt appropriate. The Chronicle spoke with former Duke players, college basketball analysts and a former staff member on those few years, and what they had to say (edited for length and clarity) is below. Here is an oral history of a fascinating time in Duke-North Carolina lore.

March 4, 2006: No. 15 North Carolina 83, No. 1 Duke 76: A stunner. On Senior Night for Duke greats JJ Redick and Shelden Williams, the Tar Heels played spoiler. The spring prior, North Carolina won its fourth national title, and first under Roy Williams, who returned to Chapel Hill in April 2003 after a decade-plus at Kansas. In the wake of that title, North Carolina lost its top seven scorers to the pros, but help was on the way. Williams brought in one of the top freshman classes in the country, featuring four-stars Bobby Frasor, Danny Green and Marcus Ginyard. And Tyler Hansbrough.

In his first trip to Cameron Indoor Stadium, Hansbrough (27 points, 10 rebounds) helped the Tar Heels seize control midway through the second half. Add in a cold-as-ice night from Redick (5-of21 from the field), and North Carolina snagged its first win in Cameron Indoor since 2001.

It was a gut-punch for Duke, and an early sign of what Hansbrough brought to the table.

Greg Paulus, former Duke point guard from 2005-09: It was emotional, and I know how much we wanted to send those seniors out [with a win].

Seth Davis, Trinity ‘92 and CBS Sports college basketball analyst: I remember seeing [Hansbrough] at the Peach Jam, and he had a big reputation and I wanted to watch him play. And I saw his first game, and I said, “Is this what everyone’s like making a big fuss about? Like, I don’t get it?” And then I watched him play a second game, and I’m like, “I mean, he’s pretty good, yeah maybe a little better than I thought but I don’t understand why everyone’s talking about, like he’s so great.” The third or fourth game, I’m like, “Alright, I got it.”

Jay Bilas, former Duke forward and ESPN analyst: He’s one of the relative few players where you could use the word relentless, and it applied. He was truly a relentless player. But I saw that in him in high school, where you go, “Okay, they’re going to the Final Four with this guy.”

Davis: It was the way, when I’m talking about playing hard, but he played consistently hard. I mean, even in high school, it was just like, he played so hard, every possession, that he just wore people out with his level of concentration.

February 7, 2007: No. 5 North Carolina 79, No. 16 Duke 73: With Redick and Williams off to the pros, a new era was underway in Durham. A fourman freshman class consisting of Scheyer, forwards Gerald Henderson Jr. and Lance Thomas and center Brian Zoubek entered the picture.

In his Duke-North Carolina debut, Scheyer showed just how much fight he had in him, dropping 26 points in 38 minutes, including four triples. The Blue Devils came up short, but their freshman guard had arrived.

Bilas: Jon may be the most underrated superstar that Duke’s had. He was a fabulous player, and had four just fantastic years where, he was an outstanding all-around player. At 6-5 or so, he could handle it, he could pass it, he was an excellent 3-point shooter.

Spatola: There’s no player I’ve ever been around in my career who is a better winner than Jon. And I don’t mean that sort of vaguely, like the dude figured out how to win. And I think you know, he was a good player, he was not the most gifted, he was certainly not the most gifted athlete. But Jon Scheyer figured out how to win, like he was going to figure out how to win in practice, he was going to figure out how to win games.

Davis: He had a very cerebral approach to the game, he just had a consistent level of effort, he had a real toughness about him, it was a competitive [approach]. He was locked in, he wasn’t gonna give you like a 3-for-13 from three type of game. If he wasn’t making threes, he found other ways to beat you.

08 represented a rebound year for the program, as the Blue Devils ended 13-3 in the ACC and were a No. 2 seed in the Big Dance (before losing to West Virginia in the second round).

Part of that rebound was a long-awaited win in Chapel Hill, the first double-digit road victory for Duke in the series since 2002. Thanks to 13 triples and six double-figure scorers— including Scheyer, who had 17 off the bench— Duke proved that, with the core of Scheyer, Henderson, Thomas and freshmen Kyle Singler and Nolan Smith, it could hold its own against the Tar Heels.

Paulus: I remember us sharing the ball and shooting the ball really well.

Spatola: There were two times where we beat them, and happened to beat them over there, it could have been at our place, but we beat them over there, and I was like, “Oh, my God, like, how in the world did we do this?” Because I felt going into the game that they were much better than us. And that was one of those years and then the other was 2012, the year Austin [Rivers] hit that shot.

Paulus: We grew up together. When those guys came in as freshmen, we had one of the youngest teams in the country at that point. You’re learning together, you’re working together, you’re growing together.

Spatola: I vaguely remember Jon having a night, and it was very typical Jon. It was just kind of who he was. But I do remember that being a year that I didn’t think we were gonna be able to win, certainly over there.

Paulus: You try to work hard enough to be in that game and be in those moments.

Couresty of Duke Athletics

Jon Scheyer averaged 22 points his senior year against the Tar Heels.

Chris Spatola, former Duke director of basketball operations: In my five years there, there was no player who consumed one of our scouting reports more than Tyler Hansbrough. He was the toughest guy, in my estimation, and you can ask the other guys, but in my estimation, he was the toughest guy to prepare for.

Paulus: He’s so cerebral … you can see him making those coach-type plays. He had such a feel for those types of moments.

February 6, 2008: No. 2 Duke 89, No. 3 North Carolina 78: Going into this one, Duke had lost three straight to the Tar Heels. However, 2007-

Spatola: When you’re going over there, there’s nothing extraneous. Families didn’t travel over there, we were a very limited travel party, we were in our own little camp and the home team had a lot to deal with. The second game of the year, College Gameday was usually there, there was a lot of home distraction that, when you went on the road, you could kind of circle the wagons and then use their crowd as a little bit of a motivating factor.

Bilas: [Scheyer was] just a fantastic player that I don’t think has gotten near the credit he deserves for being one of the all time greats at Duke. There

See ORAL HISTORY on Page 10