These off-court "madmen" did not return to the dormitory in the winter, and set up tents next to the stadium to live for more than two months, just to grab a ticket for a basketball game.
On the day of the game, they painted their bodies blue and entered the Cameron Arena to welcome the home team with a sound of 121.3 decibels.
One of the things that makes this group of "madmen" so fanatical is the hero of our story today, Old K coach, Mike Krzyzewski.
They named the tent complex outside the arena after Old K's surname and the course after Old K's nickname in honor of his achievements at the school.
But when we go back in time 70 years, this surname from Eastern Europe would have been regarded as a lowly second-class citizen!
Coach K Sr. was born in Chicago, USA, but his ancestry is far away in Europe. In 1918, with the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire after the end of World War I, the Shashevsky family from Galicia chose to emigrate at this time.
In 1947, Mike Shashevsky was born. In the neighborhood where he grew up, all Poles living there wanted their children to be "decent Americans." His father, Wilhelm Šaszewski, changed his last name to Klaus in order to get a job, and Mike's father did not even allow them to learn Polish in order to make his son speak a pure American pronunciation.
His father was an elevator operator in the mansion and his mother was a hotel cleaner, and they supported the family on a meagre salary. Mike has loved basketball since he was a child. With his outstanding skills, he received an offer from West Point head coach Bob Knight in high school.
When the parents learned that their son would be able to attend the president's school for free, they were crazy, but he himself was not interested in it, and he wanted to be a player more than an officer.
In the end, under the strong persuasion of his parents, he compromised, but as everyone knows, this compromise changed his life.
In such an elite school, Mike not only learned how to be a leader, but under the influence of Coach Knight, he found a new direction in his life - to become a basketball coach.
In 1980, former Duke basketball coach Bill Foster was poached by the University of South Carolina. While athletic director Tom Butters was struggling to find a new manager, Mike, who had coached at his alma mater for five years, handed in his resume. The Knight coach's protégé caught Butters' eye. Professional tactical ability, leadership temperament of a military school graduate, and witty eloquence made Mike stand out in the interview.
In this way, 33-year-old Mike Shashewski officially became Duke University's K coach.
But success didn't happen overnight, and so did Old K. Being Duke's coach meant not only competing with North Carolina, who was 8 miles apart, but also getting acquainted with the players and building the team's culture.
At that time, Duke and North Carolina were not at the same level, the latter sitting on "Cobra" James Worthy and Michael Jordan, who had not yet become a Chicago brine, who won the NCAA national championship in 1982.
As a rookie coach, Old K's first three years of coaching career made him almost fired.
In 1983, Duke recorded the team's biggest loss in the first round of the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) tournament, defeating the University of Virginia by 43 points. And throughout the season, they have only won three games.
After the game, the official fan organization "Iron Duke" surrounded Butters and demanded that he fire the old K! His eldest daughter Debbie was still being taunted at school, and as a father, Old K certainly did not sit idly by, telling his daughter: "Shashevsky never flinched! Then secretly swallowed this breath.
Although the record was not ideal, director Butters did not let the coach go, and also handed him a contract extension backhandedly, believing that the old K could help Duke out of the difficult situation. Perhaps it is because of this trust that Duke is a place that Coach K is willing to fight for the rest of his life.
Even after a losing season, Old K never lost confidence because he believed in his players and the players believed in him. Years later, guard Johnny Dawkins, who was drafted with the tenth overall pick in '86, recalled in an interview about the situation on the team.
'There's no one more passionate than a coach, both on the pitch and in life, who brings us together and talks to each and every one of us non-stop to help us be tough. However, it is true, and the old K turned in a 24-win record the next season and broke into "March Madness" for the first time.
In the '85-'86 season, Duke achieved a true rise, winning 37 games. Not only did he win the Atlantic Coast League Championship, but he also reached the final in March Madness. The voice about Old K leaving class can no longer be heard.
Duke has become a team that no opponent can ignore, and they reached the Final Four for the next four years. And in front of Old K and Duke, there is still the final goal left - the national championship.
Eager to prove himself, the young K coach worked tirelessly on the tactics that would work best for Duke, and that year, he recruited Grant Hill, who was named to the McDonald's All-American team.
As a 2.03 small forward, Hill not only integrates attack and defense, but also has the speed and organizational ability of a guard, and under the cultivation of the old K, he became the first player in ACC history to score 1900 points, 700 rebounds, 400 assists, 200 steals and 100 blocks.
In addition to Hill, Old K also cultivated another trump card - Christian Leitner. This handsome-looking white guy was once voted the most annoying college player in history in the votes of the prestigious sports media (ESPN) because of his looks, skin color and hubrical personality.
Leitner beat Baby Shark twice and squeezed him out of the national team spot, becoming the only college student in the 1992 Barcelona Dream First team.
Such a promising lineup allowed Coach K to solve Duke's biggest problem in the new season - speed. Back in the '89-90 season, they were beaten by UNLV by 30 points because of this weakness and hated the finals. And when they address their weaknesses, the team becomes unstoppable. What makes opponents even more desperate is that they also have the league's highest shooting percentage, coupled with the dynamic offense and staring defense that Old K is famous for, they can average more than 90 points per game.
The entire NCAA was shrouded in the Blue Devils, who went all the way to avenge UNLV and beat Kansas 72-65 in the finals to lift the team's first national championship in history.