Duke Football: Daniel Jones set to start for Blue Devils at quarterback

Quentin Harris did what was asked of him, but now it is time for Daniel Jones to take back over the reigns of the Duke football team’s offense.

Duke football coach David Cutcliffe announced this morning that Daniel Jones will be the starting quarterback as the 22nd-ranked Blue Devils face Virginia Tech in Wallace Wade Stadium tonight at 7 p.m. EST on ESPN2.

Just three weeks after the redshirt junior suffered a broken collarbone when he was sacked during the third quarter of the Blue Devils’ 21-7 win at Northwestern on Sept. 8, he is apparently fully ready to go.

This will be the 28th career start for the 6-foot-5, 220-pound native of Charlotte, N.C. Before his injury, he had started 27 consecutive games for the Blue Devils dating back to the beginning of the 2016 season. In those 27 starts, he has a record of 13-14.

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News had broken earlier in the week that Jones had been taking snaps in practice and appeared healthy enough to possibly start on Saturday.

The final news came this morning after Cutcliffe spoke with the team’s medical staff, according to Steve Wiseman of the News & Observer.

In the first two games of the season that Jones did start, he completed 29 out of 39 passing attempts for 389 yards. He had four touchdown passes and zero interceptions.

As soon as he went down with his injury, redshirt junior Quentin Harris took over as the team’s quarterback for the remainder of the Northwestern game and during the next two games. Across all three games, he completed 29 of 59 passing attempts for 388 yards, six touchdowns, and zero interceptions.

While Harris was not perfect, he did enough to keep the Blue Devils undefeated. If nothing else, he showed he is plenty capable to fill in again for Jones if his number is called again in the future.

Stay tuned to Ball Durham for more coverage of tonight’s game and follow the site’s Twitter page @Ball_Durham for updates throughout the contest.