It Might Be Riding on the Lang Factor : Blue Devils: When senior forward plays well, as he has in this tournament, so does Duke.

Grant Hill may be Duke’s undeniable leader, but if history repeats, Antonio Lang will determine the Blue Devils’ success against Arkansas in tonight’s NCAA championship game.

The play of Lang, a 6-foot-8 senior, has been the barometer for Duke all season. When he plays well, so do the Blue Devils. When he doesn’t, they struggle.

“When you look at the numbers, that’s a pretty accurate summary,” Lang said. “When I play well, we usually win. . . . Everyone on the team just seems to get involved more.”

Call it the Lang factor.

Going into every game, Duke followers know that they can expect 20 points, eight rebounds, five assists and a stellar defensive effort from Hill. With Lang, however, it is a different story.

During the regular season, Lang averaged 12.4 points and 5.4 rebounds a game. But in the Blue Devils’ five losses, he averaged seven and two.

The Lang factor has been especially true in the NCAA tournament. In five postseason games, Lang has averaged 12 points and seven rebounds.

Lang’s importance to the Blue Devils was never clearer than in Saturday’s victory over Florida.

In the first half, Lang had his problems. Not only was he dunked on by Florida’s Andrew DeClercq, but he scored only four points in 10 minutes due to foul trouble as Duke trailed, 39-32, at halftime.

“I didn’t have any flashbacks that this was my last game of my career at halftime because I knew we had a lot of time left,” Lang said. “But I knew that I needed to be out there because I had not played too many minutes in the first half.”

Lang played all but two minutes in the second half as he stepped up his game in helping the Blue Devils rally from a 13-point second-half deficit. He scored eight points and finished with 12 points and five rebounds, but his biggest play of the game did not show up in the box score.

With time running out and Florida trailing by three points, Lang stepped in front of a charging Dan Cross at midcourt and drew an offensive foul to clinch the game.

“That was just a huge, huge play by Tony (Lang),” said Duke center Cherokee Parks. “It was clutch for him to step up like that.”

Lang said he knew that Duke had a foul to give before sending Florida to the foul line, so he took a chance.

“It took a lot of courage, but I thought that I had a chance,” Lang said. “I felt that I had a position, but I didn’t know what the ref was going to call when I fell to the ground. I’m glad that he saw it my way.”

Coming back to win was only fitting for Lang and Duke’s other two seniors, Hill and Marty Clark. By reaching tonight’s final, they have become a part of college history by playing in three national championship games, having played on the 1991 and 1992 title teams.

A victory over Arkansas would put them on the short list of players who have won three national titles. The 13 on it now all played for UCLA.

“Making a big play to help us win felt great, not only because it meant reaching the championship game,” said Lang, who needs only three points tonight to reach 1,000 in his career. “But it also meant that we had another chance to play again and that is very gratifying.”

Lang, a tri-captain along with Hill and Clark, says that this has been a special season for him because of his increased role on the team.

“I knew that we had the talent to reach the championship game when we first got together for preseason practice,” Lang said. “I just didn’t know if we would be able to put it all together at the right time.

“That’s what makes this so special, because people did not expect us to do much, and now I’m playing a larger role on a team that is only a game away from winning it all.”

In order for that to happen, the Blue Devils will have to do a solid job matching up with Arkansas’ Corliss Williamson, an assignment that might fall to Lang.

“He’s so big and strong that we can only hope to slow him down,” Lang said. “You just can’t allow him to get so many good looks near the basket. If he does that, he’ll kill you.

“We know that we can’t run with them because their big men run the floor better than ours. They have more depth and have better players than anyone we’ve played all season.”