Blue Devils find lots of areas to address
Duke’s season has wobbled a bit recently with a pair of home losses across its last three games.
The Blue Devils (5-2, 1-2 Atlantic Coast Conference) try to regain some stability with Saturday’s game at Pittsburgh.
“You can only imagine all we’re focusing on right now that is Duke-related,” coach David Cutcliffe said. “… We’ve played too well, too often. We’ve got to own this.”
Cutcliffe has pointed to himself several times since the 28-14 loss to Virginia for not having the team properly prepared for all that it encountered.
There were a bunch of trouble spots, perhaps the most glaring coming with 58 rushing yards along with special teams breakdowns that allowed Virginia to break free on a few punt returns. Plus, there was shoddy tackling in general.
Virginia lost its fourth consecutive matchup with Virginia. There’s a scary trend for the Blue Devils in games against Pittsburgh because the Panthers have won the last three meetings in the series.
Duke tends to have a pass-strong offense, but that has faded a bit the past couple of games. Of Blue Devils quarterback Daniel Jones’ 240 passing yards against Virginia, 53 of those came in the final minute after the outcome appeared clear.
“We really couldn’t catch up,” quarterback Daniel Jones said. “Just weren’t able to sustain drives.”
Still, Duke’s 17 touchdown passes this year are the second-highest team total in the ACC. Three players — receivers Johnathan Lloyd and T.J. Rahming and tight end Davis Koppenhaver — all have four or more touchdown catches.
Cutcliffe said the tackling problems and the issues with punt coverages extend beyond certain plays that go awry. He said when those issues surface that there tends to be a negative impact all around.
“That creates a little bit of shock wave through your team,” he said, expressing the urgency to fix those areas.
The Blue Devils are adjusting to some injuries. Running back Brittain Brown has missed the past two games, meaning that Deon Jackson has taken on a bulked-up role in the backfield.
Jones said the Blue Devils must look at that as a benefit in that Jackson tends to have exception ball-catching and route-running skills that can be put to use.
Duke has lost its final game in October the past three years. Cutcliffe declared himself plenty fired up to make sure a slide doesn’t develop this season, and he has called for the entire program to rally around the cause.
“We’ll repair Duke football as this week goes on,” Cutcliffe said.