UNC's king, but tough Duke can still make title run

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. -- This is a good year to be Duke. It's a good year to be Purdue, too. This is a good year to be just about anybody in college basketball, because just about anybody could win the national championship.

I know, I know. There's a team in Chapel Hill that's loaded. North Carolina. Got it.

Gerald Henderson is destined to sit on the bench of an NBA team. (AP)

But that's one team. That's Tiger Woods. You can take Tiger Woods and give me the rest of the field for the 2009 NCAA title, and I'll like my chances. And if you give me the field -- you're giving me the field.

It could be anybody, I'm telling you, and this is what has me convinced:

I just watched the No. 4 team in the country play the No. 9 team in the country, and I didn't see a single NBA player on the court. Well, OK, there were some guys who will make an appearance in the NBA. But there wasn't an NBA player if you know what I mean.

Duke's Kyle Singler will sit on somebody's bench because he has an NBA skill set if borderline NBA size and athleticism. Duke's Gerald Henderson might also sit on somebody's bench, because he has NBA athleticism though not even an NBDL skill set. For Purdue, Robbie Hummel could get an NBA contract some day, but I'm guessing it will be of the 10-day variety.

And that's it. Three possible NBA players. No possible NBA stars.

And these are two of the best teams in college basketball. I'm not knocking it either. This season should be a blast. There is North Carolina, but there isn't another Kansas or Memphis or UCLA or Florida. There is North Carolina -- and there is everybody else.

Like these teams. No. 4 Duke won, 76-60, jumping the No. 9 Boilermakers behind some balanced 3-point shooting early and a whole lot of Singler late. Duke doesn't have a point guard or a center or a true superstar, but even with those holes, Duke is going to beat a lot of teams this season because Duke is going to beat up a lot of teams this season. The Blue Devils have always played hard for Mike Krzyzewski, but they've rarely played this physical. And I think that's related to the talent level. Without a lot of NBA pretty boys, Duke is a junkyard dog of a team, and it gnawed on Purdue for 40 minutes.

That's why Duke could go a long way, maybe even all the way. Because it plays hard -- and because it won't have to play anybody great, not in the NCAA tournament anyway, not unless it finally runs into the Tar Heels in the Final Four collision to end all collisions.

You know why there aren't many dominant teams in college basketball this season? Because there aren't many dominant players. Not like in recent years. The past two seasons saw two of the greatest freshman classes in college basketball history, with Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, Brandan Wright, Mike Conley and Spencer Hawes entering the 2007 NBA Draft -- and the 2008 freshman class topping that haul behind NBA first-rounders Derrick Rose, Michael Beasley, O.J. Mayo, Kevin Love, Eric Gordon, Jerryd Bayless and Anthony Randolph.

This season there is an enormous vacuum of individual talent. For one thing, all those superstars from the last two freshman classes are in the NBA. For another, the current freshman crop is devoid of elite talent, at least on the level of the past two freshman classes. Add it up, and there are very few players capable of lifting a team to greatness. Tyler Hansbrough of North Carolina is one such player, and he is surrounded by several other future NBA players. Stephen Curry of Davidson is another. Blake Griffin of Oklahoma is a third. Hasheem Thabeet, by dint of his sheer size, is a fourth. But that's it.

Krzyzewski acknowledged as much after the game Tuesday, naming those four players and then saying the college game was wide open beyond them.