By Michael Wilbon
Sunday, February 12, 2006

They played hard enough and well enough to beat most teams in the country, but not Duke. For nearly six minutes to start the game, Maryland's D.J. Strawberry played such fine defense that J.J. Redick didn't get off a shot. Maryland shot about as well as Duke did, rebounded about as well as Duke did, turned over the ball fewer times . . . and lost yesterday at Comcast Center. Maryland played particularly well for much of the game. Duke played great, particularly when it had to. And we know exactly how that movie ends, don't we?

Strawberry sat at his locker 30 minutes or so after the game and put into perfect perspective what had happened over the previous two hours.

"We had to do everything right to beat them, and we didn't," he said. "We had some mental mistakes, and they capitalize on all of them. Even if you only make a couple of mistakes they capitalize. That's how they get momentum, and it leads to Redick hitting a couple of shots, and all of a sudden they're up by 10. They're always in close games, and they almost always come up with big shots. They're a great team."

The Blue Devils didn't do anything dramatic, but they might have passed an evolutionary checkpoint for the season, Coach Mike Krzyzewski said.

The last time the Blue Devils were in the Washington area, they lost to Georgetown, and they headed south lamenting how they stood around watching Redick instead of playing with him, off him and to him. That certainly wasn't the case yesterday. Yes, Redick scored 35 points, but doesn't Redick always score 35? You could almost, with a straight face, write the sentence, "Redick was held to 35 by Strawberry and Maryland." One moment Redick has 10, and in a blink, he has 26.

Maryland's bigger problem was Shelden Williams, a no-show against Georgetown, who hit 10 of 15 shots, scored 26 points, grabbed 13 rebounds and blocked seven shots. Greg Paulus, the freshman point guard, had 16 points, seven assists, and ran the team "as if he was a junior or senior," Coach K said. Sean Dockery had 15 points and no turnovers. Josh McRoberts, while he didn't make a basket, grabbed 12 rebounds. Duke's 96-88 victory over Maryland was by no means the J.J. Redick show, as prolific as he was. Just because Duke is 23-1 overall, 11-0 in the ACC doesn't mean Krzyzewski is satisfied or thinks his team is ready for March.

"I thought we took a step up today," he said. "Those Maryland kids played their hearts out. We beat a team that played winning basketball today. They played like Gary Williams teams play."

Yes, Maryland was plenty tenacious; the Terrapins played good enough defense to draw four charging fouls. (That ought to end, for at least today, this notion that the referees are conspiring to help Duke. This really is too stupid to address beyond saying that great teams, regardless of the sport, get the benefit of the doubt, whether folks like it or not. Back in the day, North Carolina supposedly was favored by the refs. A young Coach K even said there was a "double standard." Sometimes, the refs are bad, maybe even awful. But they don't conspire.)

Anyway, it sure would have helped the Terrapins if they had made some of the dozen or so shots from eight feet or closer than they missed against Duke (though Shelden Williams's defense had something to do with that). Every time Maryland missed from point-blank range, it seemed Redick or Paulus or Dockery countered with a jumper to keep Duke comfortably up by nine. The game never became a nail-biter. The Blue Devils, as Strawberry said, really do make opponents pay dearly for slip-ups.

So, now the question around here is what becomes of Maryland (15-8, 5-5 ACC) with less than a month until Selection Sunday? It's about the time to try to calculate how many wins the Terrapins will need to reach the NCAA tournament and whether Maryland can get them.

Georgetown is in. George Washington, after escaping Saint Joe's in Philly, is in unless they lose every single game from here on out. And George Mason, while working with a really small margin of error, has a good shot.

Maryland? We're going to be uttering the most dreaded word in the college basketball -- "bubble" -- for the next four weeks.

Strawberry, very smartly it would seem, had already turned his attention from Duke to the upcoming trip to Clemson, where Maryland will play Tuesday night. If we're talking about a magic number, I'd say it's 19 for Maryland, which means the Terrapins would have to win four of its final six games. And three of those games are going to be incredibly tough outs: at Florida State, at North Carolina and at Virginia, the Cavaliers' final game in their beloved U-Hall. With four of the final six on the road, winning at Clemson is just about a must, as are the home games against Georgia Tech and Miami.

And while the team can't sit around thinking "what if," it's obvious Maryland desperately misses the ball-handling and decision-making of the ineligible Chris McCray. Losing a senior guard with his skill set and calm is just a killer.

While Maryland is going to have to sweat out these last six games and the ACC tournament, Duke marches on. It's amazing the way the Blue Devils take everybody's best shot and keep winning. It's amazing the way Redick keeps scoring in the thirties, some nights in the forties. You can go years and years and not see a college player score so consistently.

"And he does it," Coach K said, "against great players and in environments where people really want to beat us and stop him. People are really defending their turf against us."

And because he's had so many games such as the one at Maryland on Saturday, Redick has come to enjoy playing on the road, to savor shutting up loud mouths.

"I wanted to hear the last few things the Maryland fans had to say," he said of his final trip to College Park.

They didn't have much to say late in the game. In fact, as Redick noticed, many left early, which is a lot better than having fans storm the court. The only way to storm the court when you play Duke is to play very close to perfect. Very good against the Blue Devils just leads to heartbreak.