A better reason to play

As much as I love the New York Yankees, I hate it when the players say a year was a failure because they didn't win the World Series (unless they are requisitely stacked, well-managed, and blow it...which many years of this past decade was not the case). Yes, they are paid a lot, and yes the goal is excellence, but you can be excellent without always winning it all; it's difficult to put together all the factors that equal a championship, and not winning it doesn't account to complete inferiority. (If Derek Jeter finishes with 10 World Series rings in 15 seasons, is he a 67% failure? Or 33%? No, he would be far beyond the modern standard. Lost seasons are part of the game; the Yankees just need to get all the different factors together to give them the best chance they can to win, and then do it.)

That's why coach Mike Krzyzewski's take on Duke not being to the Final Four since 2001 is so refreshing. He wants to win games, and he wants to be in the Final Four, but he knows it's difficult and not always a given. He considers 30-win seasons a success and measures his players by how much they fulfill their potential.

A national championship would be amazing (especially after North Carolina's dominance this past decade), but Duke has something better. Rather than a coach embroiled in recruiting scandals, academic ineligibility accusations, player violence, or demeaning attitudes, their coach supports playing the game, and seeing where it will take them. That's what will make a championship, or a Final Four, or even an Elite Eight, this year that much more fantastic.