Duke's Mike Dunleavy (left) and Chris Duhon harass State's Anthony Grundy (2).(AP)

"Our managers usually do an excellent job," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said after his team improved to 27-4. "They made a mistake. I told the kids to forget it. Herb (Sendek) was great. He told us they were wearing red so we didn't have to wear our underwear."

Duke's white uniforms and warmups are being shipped from North Carolina and should arrive in time for Saturday's semifinals.

"It was kind of crazy that we found out five minutes before we went out that we were going to wear black when we thought we were wearing white," Williams said. "They had to buy some T-shirts for us, but we didn't let that distract us mentally. We just stayed with it."

Duke wasn't particularly sharp in this one, shooting 41 percent and getting its second-lowest point total of the season. But the Blue Devils' defense was top-notch, forcing 22 Wolfpack turnovers.

"We played great defense for a long period of time," Williams said. "We kept getting stops and that was crucial for us to build on our lead."

The win was Duke's 10th in a row over the Wolfpack (13-16), seventh consecutive in the ACC postseason and moved Mike Krzyzewski within two of No. 600 for his career.

Chris Duhon made his second start with center Carlos Boozer out with a broken bone in his right foot and was impressive again, scoring 14 points and grabbing six rebounds. Shane Battier added 16 points.

Anthony Grundy scored 10 of N.C. State's first 14 points, but finished with just 11 as the Wolfpack fell to 1-11 this season against ranked teams.

Duke is trying to become just the third team in the 48-year history of the ACC to win three straight championships. N.C. State did it in 1954-56 and North Carolina in 1967-69.

The second-seeded Blue Devils got off to a poor start. Duke missed 14 of its first 18 shots, including 1-for-8 from 3-point range, before Williams and the defense picked it up a notch.

Trailing by three, Duke scored on six straight possessions as Williams had two layups, a fast-break slam and a 3-pointer that gave the Blue Devils a 31-19 lead 5:39 before the break.

Nate James and Battier also sank 3-pointers during the run, but the nation's top shooting team from long range had an off night, going 7-for-22 from beyond the arc.

The seventh-seeded Wolfpack dictated the tempo for the opening 10 minutes, then ran into a Duke defense that began to trap and force miscues.

N.C. State turned it over on four consecutive possessions during Duke's spurt and finished with 15 turnovers in the opening 20 minutes to trail by 14 at the break.

That was bad news against Duke, which is 25-2 when leading at halftime.

"Turnovers killed us," Wolfpack guard Archie Miller said. "It was even, even, even and you just can't turn the ball over. You have to be able to match Duke. If you don't get possessions at the rim it's going in their favor."

Battier was just 2-for-11 in the first half, but made two free throws, a shot in the lane and a 3-pointer in the opening 5:23 of the second half as Duke went up 51-33. The Wolfpack never threatened again.

The defeat was the first opening-round loss in the tournament for fifth-year Wolfpack coach Sendek, who upset highly ranked Duke in 1997 and reached the finals.

"To have the season end is the worst possible feeling you can ever have," Miller said when asked if he was somewhat relieved a rough year was now over.

"We worked really hard and put a lot of time and effort in and we really can't fault that. We've just come up on the short end."