Frank Dascenzo
Herald-Sun
Take a peak into Cameron Indoor Stadium these days and you'll see what Duke junior guard Trajan Langdon means.
The pressure being applied by Langdon's teammate, Steve Wojciechowski, is kind of like having your hand caught in a vise. It tightens. And tightens.
The harder you try to squeeze out of it, the worse it gets.
"I mean, when I was coming back, or trying to come back, from my injury, Wojo helped me tremendously just by having to go against him every day in practice," Langdon said.
Langdon sat out the 1995-96 season and took a medical redshirt after dealing with cartilage damage in his left knee. The aggravation, and the ordeal, of rehab wasn't pleasant. And when he was able to practice again, it was against his friend, and teammate, Wojciechowski.
Basketball is not all a glamour game of last-second game-winning shots and television lights beaming into your eyes. It's endurance and discipline and plenty of repetitive drills in sweaty gyms.
"Wojo dogged me 94 feet, baseline to baseline, he was in my face," Langdon said. "He comes at you full force. He's relentless, always trying to strip you of the basketball. You can't relax for a second when he's guarding you."
No kidding.
If Langdon is Duke's mature and superb guard whom the Devils relied on to drill 3-pointers late last season, then Wojciechowski is the picture-perfect workaholic.
The more he pressures, the more he likes it.
Why is this so vital? Or even anything new?
Well, listen to Coach Mike Krzyzewski, who sounds like a kid getting his first head coaching job instead of a 50-year-old who has won a couple NCAA championships and has coached in seven Final Fours.
The message is loud and clear from Krzyzewski. Duke won't live and die by the jumper, but by defense.
Well, defense was a trademark of Krzyzewski's better teams. His '86 team and his '92 team punished people with a fierce attack from the moment the games began. It was, more often than not, a nightmare playing Duke, especially in Durham.
Wojciechowski has earned his way through the Blue Devil program with a diligent work ethic, a knack for the hard drive and a belief that anything but all-out effort might not work.
Langdon and Wojciechowski are co-captians on this season's team, and that's a good sign. Both are mature, experienced and totally aware of the unusual preseason attention given to this team, especially the freshmen.
"There's no question Duke basketball is changing," Wojciechowski said. "You'll see us as close to what you saw in the early '90's. We want to go out and really defend people. Our weakness showed late last year when our jumpers weren't going in. This year we want to reverse that."
Krzyzewski's highly-skilled, well-coached Final Four teams all improved as the season went along. The last two years the Blue Devils were different.
I sensed Coach Krzyzewski really getting excited about this team and this season shortly after we lost to Providence in the NCAA Tournament last season," Wojciechowski said. "I think he's excited abotu the opportunities we have this year. He can sense it and he's ready to roll. I think he'll make all us better."
This is Wojo's final season in royal blue, and he wants it to be his best.
Understandably, he came to Duke and drew unfavorable comparisons to Bobby Hurley, whose No. 11 Jersey hangs from the rafters in Cameron.
Just 5-11, Wojo lacked the outside shot as a freshman and a sophomore. But last season he hit 44 percent and now ranks ninth at Duke in career 3-point attempts (248) and 11th in career 3-pointers made (87).
"The comparisons to Hurley were unfair for Steve," Langdon said. "How do you compare anybody to Hurley? I mean, all players are different. People looked for another Hurley, and that wasn't right."
Wojo's resilience is admired, if not despised by other ACC teams.
He's part tormentor, part pest, part disciple of what Duke used to be - defensively awesome.
"You're happy just to get the ball up the court against him," Landon said.
If style most counted, Wojo's wouldn't be everybody's favorite.
"Why are people on me in other places? I think I do things they think I shouldn't," Wojciechowski said. "Maybe it's jealousy. Envy. I don't know."
Nor does Wojciechowski care for that matter. He seems braced, along with Langdon, to help usher in Krzyzewski's talented freshman class that includes 6-8 Shane Battier, 6-8 Elton Brand, 6-2 William Avery and 6-10 Chris Burgess.
"I always thought I had it in me to be a major factor in this basketball progbram," Wojciechowski said. "Our freshmen are in the spotlight, and they all have great talents. But college is a whole new atmoshpere that takes getting used to. The big thing is our big guys are going to give us a presence we didn't have last year."
There's really nothing complicated about Wojo's game. He plays hard.
Perhaps that's an understatement. He plays smart. That is certainly
not an understatement.