Saturday night the Duke Football team had its first scrimmage of fall camp where Coach David Cutcliffe and the rest of the staff saw 70 snaps in different situations from the offensive and defensive. Luckily, no injury news came from the scrimmage. This is particularly fortunate as the running back position was especially hit hard over the past few weeks with Jela Duncan tearing his pectoral and Shaun Wilson and Joseph Ajeigbe also being banged up. The situation is so grim that Nicodem Pierre, a redshirt freshman and third-string quarterback, has shifted over to running back.
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Pierre is a man-child at 6’2, 210 pounds and looks to have the ability to be an in-between the tackles bruiser. Still, Pierre shifting over to running back is not something that anyone could have predicted before camp started.
Back to the scrimmage and a few things that stood out.
Johnell Barnes looks like an All-ACC type of wideout that Duke desperately needs with the departures of Jamison Crowder and Issac Blakeney. Barnes has been receiving rave reviews throughout camp and he carried his performance over into the scrimmage hauling in five passes for 103 yards. Max McCaffrey also had a solid scrimmage with 4 balls caught for 42 yards. The players behind Barnes and McCaffrey have to step up in the coming weeks to provide playmaking behind these two.
Freshman cornerback Jeremy McDuffie will get playing time this year. Duke already has a deep secondary at both corner and safety so whatever McDuffie can give will be icing on the cake. He has displayed great ball-hawking skills and in the scrimmage he picked off a pass thrown by Parker Boehme. The secondary was already one of the best in the country. McDuffie looks like he will be able to add to it.
Zavier Carmichael is proving so far he will be a competent replacement for Kelby Brown. In the scrimmage, Carmichael intercepted one pass and recovered a fumble. He was all over the field and showed why so many are optimistic about his play this season. While the scrimmage was short, Carmichael left his impression on the field.
Scrimmages provide coaches tape on how the team is progressing but they are not the end all be all for indicators on how this team will perform. Remember this was only the first one and it was played very situationally. The keys to keep an eye on as camp rolls on are the running back position and if Duke can stay healthy.