Frustration. Again. Duke football suffered its second straight frustrating loss Saturday night. Last week it was in overtime to Georgia Tech. This time it was a last-second North Carolina touchdown that did them in. This one was probably worse.
A bitter pill
What makes this loss worse is it came at the hands of a bitter rival. It becomes even more frustrating when you consider North Carolina was 5-1 and ranked 25th in one of the polls. The Blue Devils were proving they can not just play with, but beat teams like that, only to let it slip away in the end. This loss hurts…a lot.
Snatching a loss from the jaws of victory
The Blue Devils fell behind before coming back to lead by eleven. Then they fell behind by ten, but came back to lead by four on a fantastic run by Jordan Waters (15 carries for 91 yards) with just over ten minutes to go in the game.
North Carolina then mounted a drive that took them to the Duke thirty-six-yard line. But the Blue Devils’ defense came up big when R.J. Oben forced a fumble that was recovered by DeWayne Carter. It was time for a big-boy drive by the Duke offense and sophomore quarterback Riley Leonard showed that big-boy pants fit him quite well.
For the second week in a row, Leonard fought, scratched, clawed, and dragged his team down the field on a big drive late in the game. On a third and six, he scrambled for ten yards to keep the drive going. He ran for more positive yardage on the next play, before giving way to Waters and Jaquez Moore. Behind an offensive line that had mauled the Tar Heel defensive front most of the night, the Duke offense ground their way to the North Carolina eleven where they faced a third and two. Then the wheels came off.
Waters easily picked up the first down, but the Blue Devils were called for an illegal shift that pushed them back into a third and seven. Undaunted, Leonard lofted a perfect pass that Jalon Calhoun hauled in for an easy touchdown and seemingly all but put the game away for the Blue Devils. Unfortunately, right tackle Andre Harris was called for a personal foul. After Leonard managed just five yards on a third and twenty-two scramble, kicker Charlie Hamm pushed his forty-four-yard field goal attempt wide with 2:14 to play.
At that point you just had a really bad feeling about all of this. That bad feeling got even worse when Tar Heel quarterback Drake Maye hit J.J. Jones with a short pass and the Duke defensive back whiffed on the tackle. Jones turned it into a twenty-four yard gain to put the ball at midfield. The bad feeling got FAR worse when the Blue Devils were called for a facemask penalty after a ten-yard gain on a screen pass. The Tar Heels had just moved fifty yards in two plays and had the ball at Duke’s twenty-five-yard line. North Carolina would then overcome a second and nineteen after a sack to convert on fourth down, and eventually have a third and goal from the eight with time running out. As Maye was chased toward the sideline and looked to be running out of room, he zipped a pass to a WIDE OPEN Antoine Green for what proved to be the winning score with just sixteen seconds remaining. Yes, the Blue Devils moved into North Carolina territory in the closing seconds, but the damage had already been done. 35-31 final score. Duke managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
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Are there any silver linings?
The answer to that question is yes, there are. The Blue Devils certainly bounced back strong from being shoved around by Georgia Tech the week before. I thought the offensive line, which was re-tooled after the season-ending injury to Maurice McIntyre, was very dominant-the team rushed for nearly three hundred yards and averaged over seven yards per carry. In the absence of Jaylen Coleman, a combined seventy-eight yards on just twelve carries for Jaquez Moore and true freshman Terry Moore show there has been no drop-off in performance. The pass rush turned in what I think is their best game of the season. Maye is mobile and very elusive, but the Blue Devils sacked him three times, forced two fumbles, and were credited with two quarterback hurries. Most of all, Riley Leonard continues to show he has the potential to be something special.
Despite the frustrating loss, head coach Mike Elko said in his postgame press conference that his is proud of his team, “I thought we battled. I told our kids I couldn’t be more proud with the way we battled. We knew we were going to have to. We knew it was going to be that kind of game where we were just going to have to keep trying to make plays to keep up with them. I thought for the most part we did and then the final sequence of plays on offense just was a killer and to push us back and turn that into a long field goal. We just have to figure out a way to be better in that situation.”
The magic number for bowl eligibility still sits at two. They probably won’t be favored in three of their remaining five games, so there is no margin for error. The Blue Devils once again need to pick themselves up, dust off, and get ready for Miami next week.