YouTube Gold: The Magic Of Cameron

DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA - MARCH 07: "Cameron Crazies" look on prior to the game between the Duke Blue Devils and the North Carolina Tar Heels at Cameron Indoor Stadium on March 07, 2026 in Durham, North Carolina. (Photo by Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images) | Getty Images A t a certain point during Duke’s rise to iconic status during the Mike Krzyzewski era, the university began to consider a new arena.

They even had a location picked out: up the hill on what is now Coach K Highway, near the 15/501-147 ramp, if memory serves. They had to consider it, but in the end, no one had the heart to walk away from Cameron Indoor Stadium. Now 86 years old, or seven years older than Coach K, Cameron has developed the sort of aura and atmosphere that money just can’t buy.

This is why we thought that UNC and NC State made terrible mistakes when they built such big arenas. For all their flaws, Carmichael Auditorium and Reynolds Coliseum had similar mystiques. Nothing was more depressing than going to a State game during the Herb Sendek era and watching the Wolfpack play somebody like UMBC or Alcorn State with 3,000 listless, yawning people present.

It was just awful. So Duke made the right decision, and the legend that is Cameron just keeps growing. It may be apocryphal, but there’s a story that when Shane Battier arrived for his recruiting visit, the first thing that he did was to rush to Cameron and peek through the door windows.