Sophie's Choice: Duke v. Notre Dame

A recent conversation with our brothers over at Nation of Islam Sports Blog awakened us to a startling, if obvious point: most of America is torn about who to root for this weekend. For most, this is a choice between Carlos Mencia and Dane Cook, Holly Rowe and Pam Ward, gonorrhea and syphilis.

Now, we have no personal ill will towards Coach Krzyzewski and his university full of second-generation Asian-Americans – he coaches in something called the “ACC,” after all, and apparently for a “basket-ball” team, whatever that is. However, we can appreciate the magnitude of anti-Duke sentiment out there:

Google “Hate Duke,” and you get 2,070,000 hits. Even if you assume that around 25% of them concern the Klansman/almost-Senator from Louisiana, that’s still a pretty staggering collection of ill will (ND pulls in 1.6 million hits on a similar search).

So here we are: a game between the two of the most reviled institutions in college athletics. We are informed that there are no circumstances under which they can both lose (unless they are both cheating, which judging by current records falls into the “unlikely” category).

In Sophie’s Choice, a mother is forced to choose which one of her two children will live, and which will perish. Faced with a question that has no right answers, her only logical choice is to choose the one who is strongest and most likely to survive. As we -- and the majority of the nation -- are in the opposite position ("Please, take them both!"), it's clear that our only choice is to support the weaker program. Let's take a look:

Duke Blue Devils

Program Strengths:

• Um, basketball?
• Campus not located in Indiana.
  

Program Weaknesses:

• Coached by moron.
• Record since 1995: 20-122.
• No conference wins since 2004.
  
• Mandated 30 years of pestilence and plague in return for giving The Devil his coaching start.
  
• National (and local) apathy.
• Duke chicks.
  

Notre Dame Fightin' Irish

Program Strengths:

• Innumerable traditions.
• National alumni base, Catholic support.
• "Earned" bowl spots 16 of the last 20 years, including 8 BCS-caliber bowls.
• Gobs of money.
  

Program Weaknesses:

• The fat man.
• Notre Dame chicks.
• Overwhelming sense of entitlement, even when objectively ugly or bad at football.
  

The choice is clear: Duke football is a rotting carcass, deader than dead. At best, the Devils aspire to a 3-8 season and a midweek telecast on ESPN -- hell, a conference win would set them dancing in the streets.

Touchdown Jesus and his merry band of Leprechauns, on the other hand ... well, they're on life support. In this analogy, the BCS and NBC are the doctors, squeezing the Irish onto weekly national television and snuff-film quality bowl games against SEC teams. As has been noted, all they have left is their dignity. Let's Schiavo this patient while we still can.

And on that note, let us band together, fight back the nausea, and say it in unison:

THIS WEEK, WE ARE ALL BLUE DEVILS.

Go here and sign our petition.

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