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This is probably more of an off-season topic but I stumbled into it while looking into something else so now I'm curious. 

2025 is the 90th year of AP Polls.  In the first 22 years (1936-1957) Duke was a serious force.  They appeared in 135 of the first 210 polls.  That is 64.3% or almost two-thirds.  That was tied with Oklahoma for third most behind only Notre Dame and Michigan and notably ahead of Ohio State (5th with 130) and WAY ahead of Alabama (tied for 15th with 81) and Nebraska (45th with 34 appearances).  From 1936-1957 Dook was ranked in:

• All 7 polls in 1936
• 6/7 in 1937
• All 8 in 1938
• All 9 in 1939
• 5/8 in 1940
• All 8 in 1941
• NONE in 1942
• All 9 in 1943
• 5/9 in 1944
• All 9 in 1945
• 4/9 in 1946
• 6/10 in 1947
• 2/9 in 1948
• 2/9 in 1949
• 2/10 in 1950
• 1/9 in 1951
• 10/11 in 1952
• 10/11 in 1953
• 10/12 in 1954
• 9/12 in 1955
• 1/12 in 1956
• All 12 in 1957

They haven't spent an entire season ranked since.  In fact the best they've done since 1957 is being ranked in half of the polls in 1960 (6/12) and 2023 (8/16).  They also went three LONG stretches without appearing in the poll at all:

• Almost 10 years between being #8 in the 1962 preseason poll and being #20 on September 20, 1971
• Almost 20 years between being #19 in the October 18, 1971 poll and being #25 in the November 14, 1989 poll. 
• Almost 20 years between being #25 in the December 6, 1994 poll and being #25 in the November 17, 2013 poll. 

From 1958-2025 Duke is 77th in the nation with just 45 AP Poll appearances (out of 1,047 polls).  That is 20 less appearances than Indiana had in the same timeframe.  In short, Duke has been dreadful for the last 65+ years but they were one of the better programs in the nation in the couple decades before that. 

What happened and why? 

Idk, the same thing that happened to Vanderbilt football?

What about Minnesota?  Weren’t they pretty much a blue blood or near blue blood up until the 1970’s?  

My impression of Duke…basketball school. Rarely is a school a blue blood in one sport ( basketball ) without being terrible in the other. Duke, Kansas, UNC. All basketball schools, usually horrible in football. 

What about Minnesota?  Weren’t they pretty much a blue blood or near blue blood up until the 1970’s? 

My impression of Duke…basketball school. Rarely is a school a blue blood in one sport ( basketball ) without being terrible in the other. Duke, Kansas, UNC. All basketball schools, usually horrible in football.

Minnesota's run ended long before the 70s.

They won a questionable MNC in 1960 but even that was kinda out-of-the-blue and their last league title was a three-way split with Indiana (also their last) and Purdue in 1967.

By the 1970s Minnesota's greatness was already a fading memory. 

Not all blue-bloods in one sport completely suck in the other. Florida, Ohio State, and Michigan (off the top of my head, there may be others) have NCs in both and Oklahoma's BB isn't great but they've seen the F4. UCLA sucks in football now but historically they are a borderline top-25 program. The Tar Heels are about the same as the Bruins.

hated him, because he was a Co Cane

And he was a Bear.

Went up in smoke