In 1993, after Duke’s back-to-back championships in ‘91 and ‘92, the Blue Devils were still good. They lost Christian Laettner and Brian Davis but retained Grant Hill, Bobby Hurley, Thomas Hill, Antonio Lang and an emerging Cherokee Parks.
They went into the NCAA tournament 23-7, good enough for a 3 seed in the Midwest. The Blue Devils took out Southern Illinois in the first game while on the other side of the bracket, #11 LSU lost to #6 Cal, 66-64.
After the game, LSU coach Dale Brown said that Cal didn’t have a chance against Duke. Essentially, he gave them all the motivational, bulletin board material you could imagine.