Slouch likes anyone but Blue Devils

Every year on Selection Sunday, I make my own choice: Anyone but Duke.

I am not alone in this growing anti-Duke sentiment. In fact, more Americans root against Duke in the NCAA Tournament than rooted against the Soviet Union in the Cuban missile crisis.

Some might figure this is just a reaction to the Blue Devils’ remarkable pattern of success. Actually, no. We just don’t like the cut of their jib.

(When I stumbled upon a TV set last week and got to see North Carolina score the final 11 points to rally past Duke, 75-73, it nearly wiped out all the pain of several bad career moves, two marriages and one kidney stone.)

Let me be clear that I have no problem with coach Mike Krzyzewski – three national titles and 10 Final Fours – whose comportment is impeccable. In terms of criticism, Coach K is virtually off-limits; everyone else associated with Duke is open season.

(For instance, if you were briefly engaged to a Duke grad – and, granted, you were savvy enough to break it off – it still is guilt by association. Even if you just audited a single class at Duke one semester and are reading this column now, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.)

Two acquaintances went to Duke and routinely tout the school’s pristine reputation. In fact, one likes to refer to his alma mater as “the Harvard of the South.” To which I always respond: If there’s a Stuckey’s directly across from your campus, you’re not exactly Ivy League.*

(* In reality, there is no Stuckey’s anywhere in the immediate vicinity of Duke. I’m simply using a little creative license here to embolden my argument.)

Uh, is it my imagination, or do Duke players seem to be there six or seven years? Junior guard J.J. Redick? Please. When he first enrolled, Rudy Vallee was still sitting on a flagpole singing fight songs through a megaphone.

Then, of course, there is the legendary, alleged officiating favoritism toward Duke.

Duke gets all the calls.

(Duke players don’t get into foul trouble, they get into fellowship programs.)

Duke gets all the calls.

(I once saw a Duke player, on a snowmobile, plow into a family of six crossing a street … the family of six was ticketed for jaywalking.)

Duke gets all the calls.

(If Martha Stewart had played for Duke, she wouldn’t have done jail time, she would have been second team All-ACC.)

And don’t get me started on the Duke student body. I have a message for those spoiled, arrogant Cameron Crazies: You all might get the better jobs – yeah, like Daddy didn’t help – but me and my buddies get the better used stereo equipment.

Sure, I’m just a University of Maryland graduate – Class of ‘81, without honors – with a double major in American studies and parking tickets. Yes, we read while moving our lips and count using our fingers. And occasionally we’ve produced a journalist who, well, kind of makes stuff up. But we’ve never produced the likes of the unintentionally hilarious prose of Duke alum John Feinstein, the best-selling sports author who pens most of his books on the backs of carryout menus.

(Feinstein’s latest is a basketball novel, “Last Shot: A Final Four Mystery.” Here’s an excerpt from page 79: “The door closed. She was right again. He knew he wouldn’t sleep at all. There was just much too much to think about. And worry about.” I assume the text is loosely translated from another language.)

Anyway, here are a list of schools I’d select for the NCAA Tournament before Duke: Cal Poly SLO, Colorado School of Mines, Culinary Institute of America, Faber College, Bristol University, School of Hard Knocks, McDonald’s Hamburger University.

Of course, Duke made the field of 65 again. The Blue Devils’ inexorable road to the Final Four begins Friday – I just sent a check for $50,000 to their first opponent, Delaware State.

Ask The Slouch

Q. My husband says “The Contender” on NBC is his “guilty pleasure,” but I tell him it’s just stupid. Are you with me or him on this one? (Sue Ketchum; McKeesport, Pa.)

A. Actually, my TiVo has a new, built-in quality control device that prevents me from recording “The Contender.”

Q. How come nobody in baseball wants to come to Washington Thursday to testify before Congress about steroids? (Bob Crosse; Elyria, Ohio)

A. Well, for one thing, the cherry blossoms won’t be in full bloom for another couple of weeks.

Q. How deep into this Super Bowl ticket business do you think Vikings coach Mike Tice is? (Ken Lane; Beckley, W.Va.)

A. Hello? Tice went to Maryland. Heck, we have an entire academic department there devoted to scalping.

Q. Were you or The Matador or your ex-wives recently in Whitelaw, Wis.? Found an empty case of Rolling Rock, several broken hearts and one diamond on roadside. (Jerome J. Bolle; Whitelaw, Wis.)

A. Pay the man, Shirley.