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By now the act itself, a precursor to flash mobs, is so much a cliché that even WrestleMania looks spontaneous by comparison. After important wins, fans are preconditioned to seize the home court, and while the N.C.A.A. is probably loath to condone such behavior, two reasons make it a phenomenon not likely to stop anytime soon: it's an intoxicating display of school unity and it looks great on TV.

Very rarely, however, does the pandemonium itself become a story. That happened Thursday night when Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski chose to make headlines by focusing on the manner in which deliriously happy Virginia fans swarmed players and coaches of both teams, along with referees and mascots in a horde of humanity, after the Cavaliers beat the third-ranked Blue Devils, 73-68, in Charlottesville.

With Virginia fans seemingly covering every square inch of the court, Duke had to push its way into the locker room — not exactly the way you want a game to end, especially after you've just been upset.

Duke is 11-4 in the Atlantic Coast Conference, with each loss coming on the road; Maryland, Miami and North Carolina State also thumped the Blue Devils before their fans mobbed the court. With a team that should be fine-tuning its rotation before the N.C.A.A. tournament, Krzyzewski knows full well the gravity of that statistic. You don't win a national championship unless you can pack a suitcase.

The celebratory behavior is certainly not alien to the Duke basketball program, although it must be noted that a search on YouTube of "Duke fans storming the court" reveals hundreds of examples of opponents gone wild, but a scant few Blue Devils fans following suit.

There are disbelieving Virginia Tech fans galloping onto the court and piling on one another in near delirium; stunned Temple fans, mouths agape as they run around in circles; and Miami Hurricane fans, shedding their cool personae, for a spirited and impromptu mosh pit.

Even North Carolina gets into the act, although the word "saunter" seems more appropriate than "storm" in that instance. (Duke fans returned the favor after beating the Tar Heels in the 2011 A.C.C. championship game.)

Duke fans are called the Cameron Crazies, and they have certainly been known to distract opposing players, but for the most part, they play it the way U.C.L.A. fans did during the Bruins' glory years in the 1960s and '70s: they expect to win.

So does Krzyzewski, who would probably be the first to admit that he was not in the best of moods during his postgame news conference after his team lost to Virginia, an A.C.C. rival, behind a dominant 36-point performance by the Cavaliers junior guard Joe Harris. Krzyzewski was, as he explained to the news media, more concerned about his team's well-being, as his players found themselves nose-to-nose with the rabid fans who had just ridiculed and jeered them for better than two hours.

"Just put yourself in the position of one of our players or coaches," Krzyzewski said to reporters. He mentioned that fans could curse at them, or push or hit him or his players. "And what do you do? What if you did something? That would be the story. We deserve that type of protection."

There is clearly a chance of injury or of, as Krzyzewski said, a fan's provoking an opposing player into an altercation. But here's the reality: these are the same college students who often camp out for seats near the court.

By game time, they are often shirtless, painted in team colors and fueled by a heady mix of adrenaline, exhaustion, Red Bull and alcohol. Cheerleaders are revving them up, there are people shooting T-shirts out of hand-held cannons, and mascots are frolicking to the university band's blaring music. Players are encouraging them to cheer loudly, and oftentimes a public-address announcer is exhorting the crowd to "make some nooooise!"

But beyond that, they are college students, a sui generis, and unless they are English majors, their game-day vocabulary rarely has room for words like "prudence" or "consequence."

The truth is, no opposing fan ever feels badly for Duke's coach or players, in the same way that no tears are shed on the other side when Tom Brady throws an interception or LeBron James misses a free throw.

For fans of the teams that play the Blue Devils in basketball, every game is a championship game and every celebration — which in recent years, have been slightly more prevalent — is a chance for them to run to center court and thumb their noses at the program that always seems to have its pick of the best high school recruits.

"It's not all fun and games when people are rushing the court, especially for the team that lost," Krzyzewski said. "Again, congratulations to them, and they should have fun and burn benches and do all that stuff. I'm all for that. They have a great school, great kids, but get us off the court. That's the bottom line."

It was a rare loss of composure for Krzyzewski — Burn benches? Really? — but it was understandable: a 66-year-old had just emerged from a mosh pit.