Behind Duke's loss, thoughts on Gary Williams, Paul Hewitt, more

James Johnson's game-winner lifted Wake Forest over No. 1 Duke on Wednesday night. Bob Rosato/SI Seth Davis's Mailbag Seth Davis will periodically answer questions from SI.com users in his Hoop Thoughts column. Name: Email: Hometown: Question: SEND

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. -- The University of Connecticut should consider itself forewarned: This number one stuff ain't all it's cracked up to be.

Assuming the No. 2 Huskies are able to get by Providence at home this weekend, they will become the nation's fourth number one team in as many weeks on Monday ... just in time for them to play at No. 7 Louisville that very night. That is the scenario that awaits as a result of No. 1-for-a-week Duke's 70-68 loss at sixth-ranked Wake Forest Wednesday night at Lawrence Joel Coliseum.

Ironically, it was then-No. 1 Wake Forest's own pratfall at home against unranked Virginia Tech last week that allowed Duke to ascend to the top spot in the first place. The perils of being No. 1 is just one of many important lessons that we learned in Winston-Salem Wednesday night. Since this was a school night, let's crack open the textbook and see what else we discovered.

1. Size matters. Wake Forest has a big man at every position, from the smallest starter, 6-foot-2 point guard Jeff Teague, to 7-foot center Chas McFarland. Three of the Demon Deacons' four subs Wednesday night were 6-3 or taller. When we think about big teams, we tend to think about inside scoring and rebounding, but while the Deacs actually lost the battle of the boards Wednesday (Duke outrebounded them by four, and the Blue Devils snagged 15 offensive rebounds), their size bothered the Blue Devils most on the perimeter.

Duke shot 4 for 22 from three-point range, and the Blue Devils' overall field goal percentage of 33.3 percent was their worst of the season. When another former No. 1, North Carolina, came into Joel Coliseum on Jan. 11, it lost after shooting 6 for 23 from three. Coincidence? Me thinks not. Wake Forest ranks third nationally in field goal percentage defense and sixth in three-point percentage defense. That's what I call coming up big.

2. Experience, on the other hand, doesn't always matter. Duke was supposed to be the veteran group, but on the game's deciding sequence, an inbounds layup converted by Wake sophomore forward James Johnson's with 2.8 seconds left, the Deacs were the ones who were poised, while the Blue Devils looked callow.

In the Wake Forest huddle, coach Dino Gaudio designed an inbounds play in which Teague was supposed to run from one side of the court through two screens to the other side. The idea was to bait the defense into overplaying on Teague, which would allow the second screener, Johnson, to seal his defender and score inside. This was not so easy to do considering it was something the Deacons had never practiced before. "It's not something we have in our playbook," Gaudio said. "We were drawing in the sand a little bit."

Meanwhile, in the opposite huddle, Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski told his players to switch on every screen, but they should "body up" Wake's big men and force the Deacs to pass the ball away from the rim. "We wanted the ball to go to the outside, so you'd switch to take the inside away," Krzyzewski said. "If they were going to do anything, we wanted them to make a jump shot."

Only one team could have its way, and in this case it was the younger one. The Deacs perfectly mimicked their coach's lines in the sand, while both Nolan Smith and Gerald Henderson of Duke failed to stay with Johnson and body him up. That allowed Johnson to catch L.D. Williams's pass in the clear and slip in the game-winning layup. "You need to be very physical on that play," Krzyzewski said. "We were not physical on that play. We deserve to lose if you don't do that."

3. Duke is officially going through a crisis in the middle. You can call Brian Zoubek the incredibly shrinking center. The Blue Devils' 7-1 junior has been a pleasant surprise for most of the season, but he has been a non-factor in ACC play, averaging 4.6 points and 5.0 rebounds in 16.4 minutes. He played just five minutes in Duke's win over Georgetown on Jan. 17.

Krzyzewski is trying to hold things together with scotch tape and bubble gum, rotating two reserves, 6-8 junior Lance Thomas and 6-10 freshman Miles Plumlee, but nothing seems to be working. If nothing else, Zoubek could have been on enormous help on that final inbound play, but Coach K did not trust him enough to have him on the floor. So instead of having to score over someone who is 7-1, Johnson only had to beat 6-5 forward David McClure.

4. Wake Forest's perimeter shooting is suspect. This dirty little secret has been masked for most of the season by the brilliance of Teague, who is making 53.1 percent from behind the arc this season. But now the secret is getting out. Teague had a quiet 11 points Wednesday night, but while he sank 2 of 3 three-point attempts, the rest of his teammates were 0 for 7.

On the season, senior reserve guard Harvey Hale is shooting 36 percent from three, but he only played 10 minutes Wednesday. Otherwise, Johnson is shooting 32.4 percent, Williams is shooting 21.4 percent, Ishmael Smith is shooting 15.4 percent and Al-Farouq Aminu is shooting 11.8 percent.

So this is a team choc full of players who are great at beating defenders off the dribble but lousy at making threes. You think the Deacs are going to be seeing a lot more zone defenses the rest of the season?

5. Duke is much tougher than it has been the past two years. The real question after this game was, how in the world did the Blue Devils play a great team on the road, shoot 33.3 percent from the field and 18.2 percent from three, yet still keep things so close? When Wake Forest jumped out to a 61-48 lead with 8:50 to play, even Krzyzewski admitted he thought his team was about to get blown out.

Yet, the Blue Devils scrapped and clawed their way back with a 20-7 run, spearheaded by Kyle Singler's nine points and capped by Henderson's clutch fallaway 17-foot jumper that tied the game at 68-all with 11 seconds remaining. Henderson also hustled downcourt on Wake's ensuing possession and pulled down a tough defensive rebound, but when he landed he fell down and committed a traveling violation. That gave Wake Forest possession and set up their climactic inbounds play.

So give Duke credit for hanging in there, but in the end, the only stat that mattered was the final score. "Our kids played so hard to put themselves in a position to win," Krzyzewski said. "Losing the game on the last play makes it hurt a little bit more. Sometimes getting hurt is good."

That, my friends, is the hardest lesson of all. Class dismissed.