Back in 2019, legendary coach, Mike Krzyzewski got pissed at Zion Williamson and RJ Barrett for rating their dunks from the Duke-UNC clash.
Advertisement
The 2018-2019 Duke Men’s Basketball team was one of the greatest college teams ever assembled. Coached by the legendary Mike Krzyzewski, the team recruited high school sensations like RJ Barrett (#1 nationally in the class of 2018), Zion Williamson (#2 nationally in the class of 2018), Cam Reddish (#3 nationally in the class of 2018), and Tre Jones (#9 nationally in the class of 2018).
This Duke Blue Devils team gave us several memorable highlights during the season. Finishing the year with an impressive 32-6 record, Zion and co. won the program’s 21st ACC Tournament, reached the NCAA Tournament for the 24th-straight time, and made it to the Elite Eight for the 22nd time in their history.
Also Read: Anthony Davis gives his honest take on LeBron James’ Lakers title aspirations amid a subpar start
Many enthusiasts believe this team was good enough to walk all over the competition and lift the NCAA Championship. However, despite their “failures” in the Elite Eight, the Blue Devils had quite an iconic run that season. Zion and RJ rating their dunks after every game was one of the many catchy moments from their run, that got fans wanting to watch all of Duke’s postgame press conferences.
“Let’s talk about the game, not the ratings”: Coach K got mad at Zion Williamson and RJ Barrett for rating dunks
Back on 16th March 2019, Duke faced off their nemesis UNC at the ACC Tournament semi-finals. As action-packed any Blue Devil-Tar Heel matchup is expected to go about, this one too was no different. Behind Williamson’s 31-point show, the 3rd seed Duke was able to defeat the 2nd seeded North Carolina 74-73.
During the same game, “Zanos” had a highlight play. Halfway into the 2nd period, he managed to intercept Coby White’s pass and went on to finish the play with an emphatic dunk.
That very postgame, a reporter asked RJ to rate Zion’s same dunk. While the 2 youngsters were having a good time hyping each other up, Coach K was fed up with his boys.
When asked about the dunk’s rating, Barrett said:
“Which one?”
Coach K: “It’s 2 points!”
RJ: “The one he had today where he took off outside the key on the fast break, I’ll give that one a 10! I had no idea he was gonna dunk that one, bro, for real.”
Z: “A 10!?”
RJ: “Yeah, it was tough!”
Coach K: “Yeah, let’s not talk about ratings. Let’s talk about the games.”
Also Read: Berserk stat shows just how dominant a scorer the Black Mamba was
While Coach K is absolutely true – a dunk is worth only 2 points, no matter how jaw-dropping it is, rating dunks was and always will be cool.
