This was easily the worst Duke loss of Coach K's tenure, and Love's role in putting an end to his career amplified its impact. It doesn't get much worse than Eric Maynor pulling up at the top of the key to beat Duke in the first round of the NCAA Tournament in 2007. Nothing compares to C.J. McCollum leading a No. 15 seed to victory over Duke. It was a kick in the gonads to be eliminated by the Mercer nerds. UNC and Caleb Love arrived with more nefarious motives.
For the majority of the second half, UNC and Duke were trading buckets and leads. With 34 seconds left on the clock, Love paused near midcourt to dribble down the clock, scanned the floor, drove his defender into a strong screen from RJ Davis, rose to the top of the key, and sank the game-winning shot. Duke fans let out bloodcurdling shouts, which were followed by a deafening quiet. For the next decade or more, every traumatised Duke fan will be telling their therapists about Love's shot and where they were at the time.
Love is a slasher who has been clutching that knife for a long time, channelling Mike Myers, Jason Vorhees, or that fisherman from I Know What You Did Last Summer. He's been saving his most brutal performances for Duke for the past two years. In Duke-UNC history, there have been a number of evil villains, but Love's is maybe the most intriguing.
Love's feelings for Duke were strong two years ago. "Caleb's dream school was Duke," his father told Benjamin Hochman of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 2020. "Coach K got here, we thought it was going to happen," he continued, "and then it didn't."
After Duke landed Jeremy Roach's commitment, the Heels sophomore point guard only committed to UNC during his senior year at Christian Brothers High School, where he was mentored by Jayson Tatum's father.
"They just told me before Jeremy committed that they wanted me to be their point guard, get my teammates involved, and come in and contend for a national title." After Roach committed in May 2019, Love told Steve Clark of TheDevilsDen.com.
According to 247 Sports, Love was the No. 2 point guard in their 2020 class, while Jeremy Roach was ranked fourth. Cade Cunningham was the lone point guard ahead of Love. Love was ranked as the 18th best prospect in ESPN's hoops recruiting database, while Roach was ranked 19th. Love chose to wear the Carolina blue after Roach was offered by Duke two years before he could enter and committed one year later.
Coach K is without a doubt the finest college basketball recruiter of the last 40 years. However, coupled with Roach's eight points and 18 percent shooting, the point guard he scorned being the difference between Duke advancing to a storybook finish and UNC prevailing as a historic 8-seed is an indelible dent in Krzyzewski's legend that will be tough to buff out.
Love's season high came in a win over Duke as a freshman. Duke has now been the site of two of his three highest-scoring contests. He scored 25 points in his first win against Duke on Feb. 6, 2021. Up until that time, he'd been averaging 10 points a game and shooting 35 percent from the field. He shot 56.3 percent from the field and 4-of-5 from beyond the arc that night. A month later, he did it again, scoring 18 points on 50 percent shooting and dishing out seven assists in UNC's 18-point triumph.
The lone blemish on Love's Duke record was an eight-point performance in a Feb. 5 loss in which he made only three of five shots and went 1-for-5 from outside the arc.
He retaliated by interrupting Coach K's homecoming celebrations. Love scored 22 points, aided by his perfect 12-for-12 free-throw shooting, but the team's absolute annihilation of Duke overshadowed him. Love's 28 points on 11-of-20 shooting from the field were even more impressive when seen in the context of Armando Bacot's internal difficulties.
Caleb Love is a folk hero for UNC's portion of the Duke-UNC divide and carved in the memories of Duke fandom as a nightmare no matter what he does from now on.
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