Know Your Notre Dame Football Enemy: The Duke Blue Devils

Notre Dame football will travel to Durham for a tricky road game in 2019.

Duke is one of those schools that manages to dominate at basketball, but rarely puts a football power together. However, under their coach David Cutcliffe, they’ve had a winning percentage of .482. That’s not good, but for a program like Duke, it isn’t bad either. The four coaches before Cutcliffe went a grand total of 43-149-1. That is terrible, but the 2019 Notre Dame football team can’t afford to sleep on the Blue Devils.

Of course, if you pay any attention to the NFL Draft, you know Cutcliffe as the guy who coached Peyton and Eli Manning, so Daniel Jones has their same fundamentals. Therefore, Jones will be expected to be a great NFL quarterback despite mixed results at Duke.

That’s true. Cutcliffe is credited as a quarterback guru. Jones’ NFL success remains to be seen. However, he was a huge part of Duke’s recent success. Jones threw for an alright, 2,674  yards, 22 touchdowns, and 9 interceptions. This was with a completion percentage of 60.5% his senior season. 

Those numbers don’t wow anyone, but he kept their offense moving. Furthermore, if Duke had anyone better, he would have been sitting on the bench. That leaves Duke with a big question: Who is the quarterback?

The safe bet is that the redshirt senior Quentin Harris wins the job. Harris took snaps when Jones was injured, and has by far he most returning experience. Of course, nothing is given, and one of Duke’s other two quarterbacks could easily win the job. Still, Harris is the favorite. An unproven thrower, Harris does have potential as a dual threat quarterback.

Last season, Duke was 77th nationally in rushing yardage. That’s good for 159.6 yards per game. That’s a very average ground attack. Jones, not being a running threat, didn’t directly contribute much to that. So, if Duke can maintain that, and even add on with a dual threat in Harris, they should have a solid running game. This would ease Harris into throwing the ball better, and would open up passing lanes for him.

Unfortunately, for that passing game, the receiving corps is going through a lot of turnover as well, and could mean throwing the ball is a struggle for Duke. Essentially, four receivers and tight ends return. None of them were great last season, but they weren’t terrible. There’s simply very little depth or experience.

If it is a struggle to throw and be balanced, then teams will key on the Duke rushing game and suffocate it. The Blue Devils need to get something through the air.

On defense, Duke will be good. They played a very young two deep last season, which will work out great this season in the form of a very experienced two deep. Duke held teams to 27.4 points per game last season. Again, not perfect, but solid for a bunch of freshmen and sophomores.

There’s some turnover at linebacker, but the defensive line and secondary are mature, experienced, and talented. The one weakness they have is a bad pass rush. Against the run and in coverage, Duke is solid.

For the Duke program, there is potential, but also question marks. More likely than not, there’s a ceiling to what Duke football can achieve. They’re not going to have the same level athletes as other ACC schools like Clemson or Miami. They won’t even have the talent of a Syracuse or a Pitt. However, they’re well coached and capable.

Prediction: Notre Dame 38 Duke 17

At the end of the day, Ian Book is likely to have a clean jersey. That’s bad news for Duke. What’s even worse news for Duke is they have to throw on Alohi Gilman and Jalen Elliott. That’s going to be a struggle, and will leave them trying to run at a team that is simply stronger than them up front.