Duke's 9th Consecutive Sweet Sixteen Is Soooooo Sweet!

Once Selection Sunday is over and the NCAA tournament's field is revealed, the next goal for coaches and players is the second weekend.

Reaching the regional semifinals means a second trip for a team and its fans. It means you have won two games and three-quarters of the schools that started March Madness will be watching the four days of games that decide the Final Four.

With its 74-61 victory over George Washington on Saturday, Duke extended its streak of consecutive regional semifinal appearances to nine.

If you're not impressed, try this: The next longest current streak is two. Washington's 67-64 victory over Illinois put the Huskies in the regional semifinals for the second straight year Saturday while Villanova and West Virginia accomplished the feat with victories on Sunday.

Duke's run is second only to North Carolina's 13 straight round of 16 appearances, which started in 1981. Sweet 16 records started with the 1975 tournament when the field was expanded to 32 teams and it took at least one win to reach the regional semifinals.  The field wasn't expanced to 64 until 1985 so the first four tournaments, North Carolina didn't have to win a pair of games to advance to the Sweet 16.

"It shows a level of consistency that we've had since we've been here and over the past nine years,"   Duke senior guard J.J. Redick said. "For the seniors, we've already been to the Sweet 16, so we're probably looking for a bit more than that."

Duke now has 19 Sweet 16 appearances second only to Kentucky and North Carolina's 20, although both of those teams lost in the second round Sunday.  Duke also owns the third-longest streak of Sweet 16 appearances with seven from 1986-92.                (Courtsey AP)

Go Blue Devils!