DURHAM, N.C. — Just after Duke’s Dame Sarr splashed a three to begin the process of burying North Carolina, I was dealing with a few splashes of my own.

A few wet my head. Another landed on my arm and the table in front of me. The largest and most concerning landed square on my keyboard.

For my own sanity, I am choosing to believe the mysterious liquid was water, cool and fresh from a spring, untouched by the lips of the sweaty undergrads hovering inches from my shoulder.

Witnessing the sport’s signature rivalry and the biggest game of the day in college basketball is a full sensory experience. I was sitting courtside, a half step outside the white lines, and most of the time, I struggled to hear the officials’ whistles. I have no idea how players can hear instructions from hoarse coaches. For more than a few moments, my laptop screen seemed to vibrate. A 23-point game in the second half sounded the same as a one-point game in the first.

Earlier in the week, the line monitors who oversee the six-week campout for students to gain access to the UNC game told me they do their best to pack as many students as possible into Section 17.

Mission accomplished.

By the second half, a cloud of body odor hung in the air.

But so did the euphoria of a 76-61 victory over rival North Carolina in a game that was hardly in doubt for much of the evening.

The best respite from the musty air of more than a thousand bodies crammed together in a space where nowhere near that many belong is waving foam fingers to the beat of “All I Do Is Win,” providing a breeze to those close enough to feel it.

Blue body paint is splashed across the sinks in the tiny bathrooms that dot the concourse, a short walk from the court.

And sitting on press row in front of the student section — close enough to have more than a few brushes with body paint — provided an experience few others in sports can rival.

A college sports palace

Playing a basketball game at Cameron Indoor Stadium is like playing a basketball game on the floor of the House chamber in Congress. A wood panel wall separates just nine rows on the lower level of the stadium from the 14 rows on the upper level. A thick brass railing sits atop it, giving the stadium a regal feel unlike any other in the sport.

It’s been mostly untouched for the eight decades since it opened. It’s only had air conditioning for the last two of those decades. The goals hang from the ceiling rather than sitting atop stanchions on the ground.

Coach K Court — a nod to the program’s proud history and its biggest legend — remains unsullied by any sponsorship logos. For now, anyway.

Box seats? Coach K — that’s former coach Mike Krzyzewski — super fan Ken Jeong, NBA legend Chris Paul and Los Angeles Rams coach Sean McVay all cram into their spots next to the unwashed masses.

So many other places would have bulldozed Cameron long ago in favor of something bigger, more modern. Duke didn’t. It’s one of the few campuses still willing to leave money on the table in the name of tradition.

Stadiums across America are moving fans farther and farther from the action, filling them with high-priced, well-catered boxes and cashing six- and seven-digit checks from sponsors to call them home for a season. No such thing exists at Duke.

The best seats in Cameron go to the students. Opponents inbound the ball close enough for the Cameron Crazies to come inches from touching their jerseys, waving bad vibes in their direction and rooting for an errant pass.

I’ve never seen a game anywhere like Cameron. And it’s just as loud — consistently and at peak moments — as anything I’ve heard in any other building that hosts college basketball games.

A pregame decibel meter on the video board pushed into the triple digits for almost a minute.

For all the hand-wringing at a Friday afternoon White House roundtable about the future of college sports that was long on complaints and light on solutions, it’s easy to forget there’s still plenty going right. Nights like Saturday in Cameron are college sports at its best.

Students who spent six weeks camping out for tickets used their final hours in Krzyzewskiville outside the stadium, helping each other apply royal blue body paint to every last crevice of their upper bodies.

A few Duke students purchased a stuffed UNC mascot only to impale it on a Blue Devils trident and hoist it above the student section. A dispenser outside the stadium entrance held earplugs for anyone who wanted them. It was still mostly full as game time approached.

After a Sarr dunk in the second half, muscle memory took over for Duke coach Jon Scheyer. He slapped the floor. Twins Cameron and Cayden Boozer combined for 33 points and 20 rebounds in Saturday’s win.

A few feet away, their father, Carlos Boozer, watched with their mother. In 2001, he helped the program capture its third national title. He’s been a fixture in Durham this year.

“You see (this rivalry) from afar, but you don’t really understand what it’s like until you’re actually in it,” Cayden Boozer said after the win.

A pregame video commemorates all five Duke national titles. The students count each one. When it concludes, the chant begins.

“We want six! We want six!”

Perhaps the Boozer twins can provide it. The top-ranked Blue Devils have as good a chance as anyone to be the last team standing from the 68-team field that will be revealed next Sunday.

Taunts to ratchet up tension

College sports can provide acronyms that require no explanation to natives and look like another language to outsiders. At Duke, that means GTHC and DDMF written across sunglasses and painted across bodies. The former is rather simple: “Go to hell, Carolina.”

The latter — “Duke, Duke, MF-er” — is an exclamation unleashed when the beat from “All I Do Is Win” drops after Lil’ Jon implores listeners’ hands to go up.

The rivalry’s undercurrent bleeds over long beyond game day. Like the best rivalries, the tension on the court reflects the tension between the two universities. Duke for the elites. North Carolina for the everyman.

Less than 10 miles separate their campuses. It’s real hate.

A meticulously researched two-page guide to UNC’s roster and a helpful reminder of the chants for Duke fans are given to students entering the stadium.

UNC guard Seth Trimble used his NIL earnings to purchase the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream shop on Chapel Hill’s iconic Franklin Street. The cheering guide called him out for making the entire team pay for their own ice cream when it opened. Another section called out UNC guard Luka Bogavac.

“ALREADY PLAYED FOUR SEASONS OF PRO BALL,” it read.

Another noted that UNC seven-footer Henri Veesaar was “very self-conscious about his facial hair” and that his fiancée “can do better.”

Scheyer — a program legend in his own right who captained the fourth Duke national championship team in 2010 and was coaching in front of his mentor Krzyzewski — drew the ire of UNC fans when he said some of his staffers were punched in the face by Tar Heels fans storming the court after last month’s upset in Chapel Hill.

Jeff Nieman, the district attorney in the county, said there was “zero evidence” to support the claim and encouraged Scheyer to exercise more discretion in his public comments. Scheyer shot back, saying he knew what he saw.

Duke might be the nation’s most hated program, but nobody hates them like UNC.

As the final seconds ticked away from a second consecutive perfect season at Cameron, another chant emerged from the students.

“Our house! Our house! Our house!”

It is. And there’s nowhere else like it.