As the second youngest of nine children, Luol Deng was seldom called upon to take charge. Though his family fled its native Sudan when he was five years old to escape the country's civil war, Deng has always been a good soldier, deferential to authority, eager to carry out instructions. "One of the first things you notice about him and his siblings is the complete respect they have for their elders," says Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski. As admirable as that sense of obedience is, the Blue Devils' fortunes in the NCAA tournament may hinge on how willing the 6'8" freshman forward is to upstage his elders—and break down defenses. If the tournament is indeed a big dance, chances are good that at some point Duke will need Deng to step out on the floor and bust a move all on his own.� That's because Deng, like a handful of other players preparing for this month's annual madness, has the ability to become perhaps the most precious tournament commodity—the game-breaker, the type of player who can carry a team through a game or, in rare instances, through an entire tournament, with a burst of talent, creativity and mental toughness. Think Danny Manning of Kansas in 1988 or Jack (Goose) Givens of Kentucky in 1978. If those seem like ancient history, just rewind one year to Syracuse freshman Carmelo Anthony's transcendence in leading the Orangemen to the national championship. While there's much to be said for strong backcourts, low-post scoring threats, balanced attacks and tournament experience, the game-breaker is the ultimate ace in the hole, the weapon that can make the difference when the matchup zones and motion offenses, the scouting reports and coaching strategies cancel one another out. A game-breaker can enable a championship contender to close the deal, as Maryland's Juan Dixon did in 2002 and Arizona's Miles Simon did in 1997. To the foe, "heartbreaker" may actually be a more appropriate term, because a game-breaker can do as much damage to an opponent's psyche as he does in the box score. When an opposing team does everything right, a true game-breaker steps forward to deny his enemy its rightful reward. He is the jitterbug who, after the opponents have played 30 seconds of lockdown defense, demoralizes them by improvising for a one-on-one bucket to beat the shot clock. (Senior point guard Jameer Nelson of Saint Joseph's, anyone?) He is the marksman who drops in three-pointers even with a defender's fingers practically massaging his corneas. ( Gonzaga's 6'4" senior point guard, Blake Stepp, comes to mind.) Occasionally a game-breaker can emerge at the other end of the floor. Emeka Okafor, Connecticut's 6'10" shot-swatting junior center, can control a game simply by slapping away potential layups. The teams that last deep into the tournament are likely to boast a game-breaker who, when called on, just takes command. "I wouldn't say that you absolutely have to have that kind of guy to win the tournament," says Oklahoma State coach Eddie Sutton, even though he has two potential game-breakers in his backcourt in 5'11" junior point guard John Lucas III and 6'4" senior marksman Tony Allen. "But having someone who can take over and carry the team for a stretch is a tremendous advantage." The consensus is that the tournament field isn't as heavily populated with potential game-breakers this year as it was last season, when Anthony, point guard T.J. Ford of Texas and Marquette shooting guard Dwyane Wade carried their teams to the Final Four. Says Texas coach Rick Barnes, "I'm not sure guys like that are out there this year." We beg to differ. The game-breakers are out there; we're just not sure who they are yet. Last year at this time, after all, Anthony was considered a sublimely gifted freshman but perhaps too callow to take his team to a championship. Wade, a junior, had had a spectacular season, but his gifts were fully appreciated only by hoopheads. By the time this year's champion snips down the nets in San Antonio on April 5, power players like Mississippi State's 6'9" junior forward-center Lawrence Roberts or Providence's 6'7" junior forward Ryan Gomes may have emerged as this year's Anthony. Or a fluid, multiskilled player like Stanford's 6'7" junior forward Josh Childress or an explosive one like Pittsburgh's 6'2" sophomore guard Carl Krauser, might be anointed the successor to Wade. Game-breakers come in as many varieties as a Starbucks latte, but they generally fall into one of the following categories. First-Option Game-breakers. These are the undisputed stars, the clear go-to guys in times of crisis. Everyone from the chancellor to the student manager knows that when the shot clock is running down, a team will hand the ball to this player and clear out. They come in a variety of packages—small, like the 5'11" Nelson; medium-sized, like Gomes, Texas Tech's 6'5" senior guard Andre Emmett or Wisconsin's 6'3" junior point guard Devin Harris; and large, like Okafor, Gonzaga's 6'10" junior forward Ronny Turiaf or 6'9", 255-pound junior forward Wayne Simien of Kansas. Not all the big dogs are big names, at least not yet. One of the tournament's charms is the stage it provides for high-caliber players from low-profile schools who lead their teams on unlikely tournament runs, a feat that could be duplicated this year by someone such as 6'2" Manhattan senior shooting guard Luis Flores. Though the sizes and styles of these players may differ, their mentalities do not. True game-breakers thrive on the knowledge that their teammates will turn to them when the game—or season—hangs in the balance. "If I'm in a close game with time running out, I want the ball," says Krauser. "I always want the chance to win the game for my team." In their tournament planning, Krzyzewski and his staff endeavored to instill that healthy cockiness in Deng. In the latter stages of the regular season the Duke coaches encouraged him—in practice, meetings and film sessions—to take over a game. "We even changed our offense over the last couple of weeks to incorporate more of what he does," Krzyzewski says. "The last freshman I did that for was Johnny Dawkins." The results haven't been uniformly positive; Deng shot 1 for 14 in a 76-68 home loss to Georgia Tech on March 3. But three days later at Cameron Indoor Stadium, he was everything Krzyzewski had dreamed of and more, using his long arms and swooping moves to score a game-high 25 points (on 12-for-16 shooting) in Duke's 70-65 win over North Carolina. Any Given Game-breakers. For 20 minutes in last season's championship game against Kansas, Syracuse guard Gerry McNamara was an All-America, drilling six first-half three-pointers to help propel the Orangemen to the title. It was the one shining moment for McNamara, a good player who temporarily became a great one, thus fitting perfectly into the mold of the Any Given Game-breaker. The 6'2" McNamara, now a sophomore, could very well reprise his role this year, although there are several similar players ready and able to step into his sneakers. Any Given Game-breakers are often catch-and-shoot specialists like McNamara, Stanford's 6'4" senior guard Matt Lottich and Duke's 6'4" sophomore guard, J.J. Redick. Their skills aren't sufficiently varied to make them their teams' usual first option, but they can break a game open under the right circumstances. Lottich is such an accomplished clutch shooter that his teammates sometimes call him Dagger. The category also has room for players like Arizona's 6'1" junior shooting guard, Salim Stoudamire, and North Carolina's 6'4" sophomore forward-guard, Rashad McCants, gifted (if streaky) players who can beat defenders off the dribble as well as with the jumper. Unexpected Game-breakers. These are the players who emerge as major threats mainly when opposing defenses concentrate on containing their higher-scoring teammates. In January, when Childress returned following a stress reaction in his left foot, the scouting report on Stanford no doubt emphasized taking away his best moves and keeping a hand in Lottich's face around the three-point arc. That's when 6'2" sophomore point guard Chris Hernandez transformed himself from a pure playmaker into a scorer. On Jan. 31, Oregon discovered how quickly Hernandez could make that transition when he scored 22 second-half points to help the Cardinal erase a 19-point deficit in an 83-80 win. It's not surprising that the teams deep enough to have such complementary players are the ones expected to last past the first weekend of the tournament. Besides Deng and Redick, Duke has two other players who have career highs of 25 points or more, 6'3" junior guard Daniel Ewing and 6'9" sophomore center Shelden Williams. Saint Joseph's is no one-man band, not when Nelson is joined by underrated 6'4" junior guard Delonte West and 6'5" junior swingman Pat Carroll.  
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