By JIM PETTIT

The nation's college elite got a taste of Duke University Golf Course last fall when the top 15 teams from the 2000 NCAA Men's Championship played in the Fall Preview Tournament.

They haven't seen anything yet.

The 2001 NCAA Men's Championship will be played at Duke from May 30 through June 2, and plenty of surprises are waiting.

''The course played pretty tough at the Fall Preview, and it wasn't even set up the way it's going to be (this month), '' said assistant professional Brent Bowen. ''It's going to be a lot different than last year down at Auburn when Charles Howell was 23-under individually. I don't think we'll see anything like that this year.''

This is the second time Duke has been the host course for the NCAA men's finals. The first time was in 1962 when a Yale golfer named Rees Jones was checking out his father's handiwork first-hand. Robert Trent Jones designed the original Duke course that opened in 1957. Nearly three decades later, Rees Jones, by then a prominent golf course architect himself, reworked the course.

''I changed all the greens I three-putted back in 1962,'' Jones said, smiling.

And he did a lot more than that.

''We basically rebuilt the whole golf course,'' Jones said. ''We lengthened a lot of holes. We graded the fairways, too. When the course was built, there was no money for fairway bunkers, and a lot of grading wasn't done because there was a minimal budget. So we were actually able to finish the job. I give Tom Butters (Duke's athletic director) a lot of credit. The golf course really needed to be rebuilt, and he put together a program that made the golf course have to pay for itself, and over the years, it has done very well.''

Jones, whose daughter Amy is a Duke graduate, did the redesign free of charge.

The eldest son of Robert Trent Jones, Rees is known as the ''Open Doctor'' for his renovations on such U.S. Open venues as Brookline, Hazeltine, Baltusrol, and Congressional.

He is famous for his ''definition in design'' method, in which the holes clearly show the golfer how to play them. There can be great rewards if a golfer is good enough to pull off a gambling shot, but stiff penalties if he fails.

''We made a lot of major cuts on the course,'' Jones said. ''Holes No. 1 and No. 2 (par fours) used to pitch to the right and now they pitch to the left.''

The green on No. 3, another par-4, was moved. Every green on the course was re-contoured.

At No. 9, a 491-yard par five, extensive grading was done. ''That's a really great, potential two-shot par-5 now,'' Jones added.

Jones was impressed with the natural beauty of the back nine, but changes were made there, too.

''I think No. 13 (a 372-yard par four) is one of the better short par fours in the Carolinas,'' he said. ''The 14th hole is a par-5 where golfers might be able to make up some ground, and No. 15 is the longest (216 yards) par-3 on the course.''

That brings the competitor to the closing holes, three par fours that could easily decide the championship.

''They provide a very formidable finish,'' Jones said, ''especially 17 and 18 because they have decent length and they can really tuck the pins on those greens if they want.''

Jones' redesign was completed in 1994.

A few more changes have been made for this year's NCAA event. Extra length has been added to holes 10, 11 and 14, raising the overall course length from 7,045 yards to 7,100.

Tour specification sand – white and fluffy – was placed in all bunkers last year.

By the time the best college golfers in the United States converge on Durham, the Duke University Golf Course will be sporting three inches of Bermuda rough and bentgrass greens tweaked to 10.5 speed on the Stimpmeter.

The NCAA brings in a committee from the United States Golf Association to oversee the competition.

''We're looking forward to it,'' Bowen said. ''We've been preparing for it for well over a year. The Fall Preview last September was kind of a trial run for it, and that went pretty smooth, so we're all very upbeat about it.''

Jones believes pin placements will give the course a different look each day of the tournament.

''There are everyday hole locations and there are tournament locations,'' Jones said of his design. ''I think the NCAA will be able to rotate the pins a lot if they go with the 6-6-6 method of six easy pins, six medium pins and six very tough placements.''

Jones also believes the winner will be the player who not only hits good shots, but also thinks well. ''They're going to have to think about their tee shots and their position off the tee,'' he said. ''They're going to have think about whether to go for the flag or for the center of the green on their approach, because these greens are a lot smaller than a Robert Trent Jones Trail course.''

The NCAA event is a stroke-play tournament now. In 1962, it required 36 holes of qualifying, with the top players advancing to match play.

''I didn't make the cut in 1962,'' said Jones, who will speak at this year's pre-tournament banquet.

Consequently, his name isn't on the NCAA championship trophy.

No matter.

By the time the 2001 NCAA Men's Championship is complete, his name will be indelibly burned into every participant's brain.