Duke Blue Devils:

It wasn’t always smooth sailing for David Cutcliffe, but it sure felt like the Blue Devil legend got the most out of his teams more often than not. Successor Mike Elko sure did in the two years he was in Durham. Now, Duke turns to Manny Diaz, the longtime defensive coordinator and former Miami head coach in hopes of keeping a two-year bowl streak alive.

Diaz was 21-15 over three seasons at Miami and went 0-2 in bowl games, drawing the ire of many for squandering some obscene talent in Coral Gables. He has far less talent here and a team with a lot of playing time battles on the horizon.

 

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Offense

Riley Leonard now resides in South Bend, so Duke will either turn to last year’s fill-in Grayson Loftis or newcomer Maalik Murphy. With no future at Texas because of Quinn Ewers and Arch Manning, Murphy hit the portal and may very well get a shot right away in Jonathan Brewer’s offense. Brewer and Diaz have history after working together at Miami. When Diaz went to Penn State, Brewer went to SMU and coached up quarterbacks.

So, Murphy may be in really good hands here. WR Jordan Moore hit the portal, but then backpedaled after he led the team with 835 yards and eight touchdowns. Unfortunately, RB Jordan Waters did leave and Leonard was the third-leading rusher with 352 yards. As a result, Murphy’s legs may be the deciding factor in the QB battle and would elevate the ceiling of the team.

Defense

You can see why the Duke athletic department would go from Elko to Diaz, as defense was the calling card of last year’s Blue Devils bunch. They were 28th in yards per play allowed and 16th in scoring defense. For Duke, the goal is not to make the playoff or win conference titles. It is to go to bowl games and being stout on defense is the path of least resistance to get to six wins.

New starters dot the depth chart, but the two most important players from last year’s defense – LB Tre Freeman (106 tkl) and S Jaylen Stinson (88 tkl, 6 PBU) – are back and will be something to build around.

Outlook

It is entirely possible that Diaz will thrive with lower expectations. When he took over at Miami, the administration said that winning nine games per season wasn’t enough when they fired Mark Richt. Diaz couldn’t fill the shoes of Richt with those lofty goals. It may take a year to get his sea legs at Duke, where academic requirements are quite high, but this could certainly work out. I have Duke at 5.4 wins, so a slight lean Under with them as a dog in every ACC game.

Pick: Under 5.5 Wins

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