The four teams from North Carolina have won it 43 times. Duke had claimed it a record five straight before yesterday. Duke star guard Chris Duhon had raised six fingers after the Blue Devils' semifinal win, which drew the ire of the Terps.

"If he wants to hold up six fingers when he only has five, he's never going to have a chance to do that again," said Maryland sophomore Nik Caner-Medley. "Don't count your chickens before they hatch."

"We're always winning," senior guard Chris Duhon said. "We're always on top. And people get tired of that. But what they don't realize is it never gets old for us. Never."

Last season, as they left the court after their 84-77 victory over N.C. State, the Blue Devils held up all five fingers, showing off their consecutive tournament titles. So how would they handle six?

"We are not going to tell you our secrets,'' Duhon said. "Be there with your cameras ready and we will surprise you.''

Duke's Mike Krzyzewski and the dozens of other college coaches recruiting Duhon had to go through Vivian Harper. At the time, she and her two sons were living in a modest house in Slidell. It was a house Harper nearly lost in June 1999, according to court documents.

Trustmark National Bank filed court papers to seize the house after Harper allegedly failed to make mortgage payments for more than six months. Foreclosure never took place. Though court documents offer no details as to how the situation was resolved, Harper remained the owner. Privacy laws prohibit Trustmark from disclosing information about the matter, said Rob Armour, the bank's assistant marketing director.

On preparing for his first Duke game: "When I put the jersey on and I was about to go play, I just stared at it for two or three minutes. Then I put on my top and I went into the bathroom and I looked in the mirror and my first thought was, 'That's a sexy man in the mirror.' Then I had to catch my focus. I looked down at my chest and saw the Duke emblem and I really wanted to cry. I knew I couldn't do that before a game, but it just meant so much to me to have the uniform on."

The Bulls are done Wednesday. Jim Boylan is done Thursday, Chris Duhon and Ben Gordon Friday, and if we're lucky, Luol Deng and Kirk Hinrich Saturday.

Disclaimer: Duhon might not be booted out until Saturday if he doesn't get his wake-up call. Think about that: Duke has such high entrance requirements, and it produces guys who can't set an alarm clock.

I think whoever our second team is could definitely contend for the ACC championship right now

According to the Times-Picayune's Josh Peter, in the summer of 2000 Vivian Harper, mother of Duke incoming freshman point guard Chris Duhon, moved from her home in Slidell, La., to a two-bedroom apartment in Durham, N.C. She was given a job at a firm called NCM Capital Management Company, a billion-dollar money management firm owned by a man named Maceo Sloan, among whose possessions is an autographed basketball signed by the 1991 Duke championship team, Coach K's first title squad. Workers at the firm say the job was never posted. They also allege that Harper was given a substantial raise within four months.

There's more. Peters also reports that Carlos Boozer Sr., the then-unemployed father of former Duke star Carlos Boozer, was given a job at GlaxoSmithKline, a pharmaceutical company owned by Robert Ingram, who is a close friend of Coach K's. In order to take the job, the elder Boozer relocated from Alaska.

Coach K? Say it isn't so!

The newspaper report, from the New Orleans Times-Picayune, suggested the parents of two Duke players -- junior guard Chris Duhon and former center Carlos Boozer, now a rookie in the NBA -- received disproportionately high salaries from employers who happened to be Duke boosters. Both players' families moved to the Durham area when their sons reported to Duke.

"Yes it's true," Duhon explained, " I sleep with a ball. I carry it wherever I go the day before and day of our games. Whenever I get off a bus, I always have a ball in my hands. I just like to get the feel of it and have great dreams that night. I'm not ever going to say that when I wake up the ball isn't on the floor, but I want it there to have good thoughts when I go to bed."

Vivian is a single mom who moved to Durham, N.C., after Chris simply told her, "Mama, I can't do this without you."

To refresh, the Georgia Tech players were stretching in preparation for the game and were unaware that Duke would be coming out to take some shots.

"As you saw out there, Georgia Tech, when they were stretching, they took up the whole court, while our guys are out there shooting," Duke guard Chris Duhon said. "That's a sign of disrespect. We are not going to have that."

"It sends a message to this whole league that we have dominated this conference over the last eight years," Duhon said Tuesday. "We are just going to keep continuing to do it. I think it sends a message to the other teams that they are always playing for second.''

"I sat down and had long discussions with myself," Duhon said. "It got a little heated at times. I just wanted to find myself; I didn't know who I was.

When he looks into your eyes, he's almost angelic

But, we could have a problem here. It's not a good thing if an important Duke supporter gave Duhon's mother an unposted job - at what fellow employees reportedly suggest was an overpaid salary to an underqualified person - simply because her son signed with the Blue Devils.