Duke's Newest Villian?

Duke University Basketball, better known as the Duke Blue Devils, have been around since 1906. In the history of the program, they have won five national titles, been a runner up six times, made the final four 18 times, have won the ACC Torunament 41 times and won the ACC regular season title 24 times. 36 players have been chosen as All Americans 60 times. It's safe to say that the Duke Basketball program has been quite good for a long time now. With that success rate, your sure to have a few villains along the way.

What defines a villain in college basketball? A college basketball villain has one of two qualities (Bleacher Report):
1. A significant portion of the college basketball viewing public roots for that person or group to fail.
2. That person or group does or represents something that creates considerable ill will toward that person or group.

As a team, Duke does that with how good a school they are in Men's Basketball. There's more to it than that. Four players come to mind, that have played for the Blue Devils, that are thought of as Villains. J.J. Reddick, Greg Paulus, Christian Laettner and the newest name on the list, Grayson Allen. Reddick and Paulus are different molds for villains than Laettner and Allen.

J.J. Reddick will go down in history as the greatest 3-point shooter to ever attend the school. He set the ACC records for most career points and most career points in the ACC Torunament. That tournament points record was subsequently broken by UNC's Tyler Hansbrough in 2009. Reddick also set several Duke records, including most points in a single season, and is currently the all-time leading scorer for the school. What made Reddick so hated around the country was he could hit the big shot in the big spot when it was needed. He hasn't quite done that to date in the NBA, but he was on his game in college. Being arrogant as a freshman contributed to his image, and being one of the nation's best players (he won several national player of the year awards in 2006) focused attention on him. Reddick was also resented a lot because he was hitting big shots on National TV all the time because Duke was so good they were on National TV a lot.

Then, you have Greg Paulus. He picked up right where J.J. Reddick left off. To be fair, Paulus was nowhere near as lethal a shooter as Reddick was during his career. But still he was not only a good shooter, but he had a bit of a cocky attitude as well. Paulus had an outstanding freshman year. His 187 assists ranked third behind Bobby Hurley (288 in 1990) and Jay Williams (220 in 2000) among the freshman assist leaders in Duke history. His Sophomore and Junior years were just as productive, his scoring numbers went up, while his assist totals leveled off. He, like Reddick, had a bit of a cocky attitude and was able to back it up with his play.

And how can we forget about the top of the list of villains at Duke, Christian Laettner. It was a role he relished in. What made Laettner so hated was not only the big shots he hit, but the plays away from the ball he was noted for. The numbers only tell one side of the story. For his career, Laettner averaged 16.6 points and 7.8 rebounds per game while making almost half of his three-pointers. He averaged 21.5 points per game his senior season, garnering every major national player of the year award. His career is widely regarded among the best in college history, and he is enshrined in the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame. He holds the records for the NCAA Tournament for most points scored at 407, most free throws made at 142, most free throw attempts at 167, most games won at 21 and most games played at 23.

Laettner's iconic moment was the last-second shot he made to beat Kentucky in the 1992 NCAA semifinals. Then there was the other moments. Case in point: Earlier in that 1992 semifinal game against Kentucky, Laettner had intentionally stepped on the chest of fallen Kentucky player Aminu Timberlake under the basket. He later apologized for it, but it helped cement his legacy as a villain in the sport of College Basketball. Laettner was widely reviled by opposing fans throughout his career, to the extent that more than 20 years after graduating from Duke, he was voted the most hated college basketball player in history in an ESPN online poll. This led to ESPN's creation of the 30 for 30 documentary I Hate Christian Laettner that explored five factors for this widespread and persistent hatred: privilege, race, bullying, greatness, and physical appearance. So yeah, even now twenty years later, he's still the most hated man in College Hoops.

In today's game, Grayson Allen has taken on the Laettner mold of being the villain in College Hoops, to a degree. He's a good basketball player, just look at his offensive numbers. During the 2015-2016 season, Allen has been one of the best offensive players in the ACC, averaging 21 points per game and shooting 43% from three-point range. As good as an offensive talent as this kid is, he's also received national attention for intentionally tripping Louisville's Raymond Spalding in their first meeting of the season. This planted the seed that he could be the next coming of Laettner. Now look at the second game against Louisville that season. He got elbowed in the head while scuffling for a ball on the ground and later received a technical and ejection for yelling at a referee following his fifth foul on a charge call. Fast forward to February 26, when Allen received a reprimand from the ACC for his second tripping incident in less than a month. On February 25th of this year, in the closing seconds of a 15-point win against FSU, Allen tripped FSU's Xavier Rathan Mayes.

He still has the time to possibly make an impact with his scoring prowless, so that is still an open window. His attitude does remind you a lot of Christian Laettner. Looks like Duke has its newest bad boy!