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Duke Blue Devils still clinging onto bowl game hope after devastating loss

By Kevin Connelly

CHAPEL HILL, NORTH CAROLINA - OCTOBER 26: The Duke Blue Devils prepare to run onto the field before their game against the North Carolina Tar Heels at Kenan Stadium on October 26, 2019 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)
CHAPEL HILL, NORTH CAROLINA - OCTOBER 26: The Duke Blue Devils prepare to run onto the field before their game against the North Carolina Tar Heels at Kenan Stadium on October 26, 2019 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images) /
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The Duke Football team is still hoping to reach a bowl game despite its crushing loss to the North Carolina Tar Heels on Saturday afternoon.

After a gut-wrenching loss on Saturday afternoon to the North Carolina Tar Heels, the Duke Blue Devils are still holding onto its hope of reaching a bowl game in 2019.

Duke has been in a bowl game for every season since 2017 and the Blue Devils have played in the postseason in six of the past seven seasons, with the lone exception being the 2016 season.

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Prior to 2012, the Duke football program did not play in a bowl game since the 1994 season.

With a 4-4 record and a daunting schedule remaining, the Blue Devils still need two more wins in its last four games to become bowl eligible.

ESPN college football analysts Kyle Bonagura and Mark Schlabach still have Duke reaching the postseason, but with the teams performance in the recent weeks, the prestige of that bowl game as dropped significantly.

Bonagura has the Blue Devils being place in the Bad Boy Mowers Gasparilla Bowl which takes place in Tampa, Florida on December 23. If Bonagura’s projected were to come true, Duke would be playing the Navy Midshipmen.

Mark Schlabach playing a little later in the bowl season and in a game the Blue Devils are familiar with in the Quick Lane Bowl on December 26 at Ford Field in Detroit. Schlabach has Duke facing the Nebraska Cornhuskers in this game.

Duke played in the Quick Lane Bowl in 2017 when the Blue Devils defeated Northern Illinois, 36-14.

The Blue Devils head into a bye week before the stretch run of the season when Duke plays Notre Dame, Syracuse, Miami (FL), and Wake Forest. The positive news for Duke is that the only game that will not be played at Wallace Wade Stadium is the season finale against Wake Forest.

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