It took less than a half for fans to start questioning Manny Diaz's defense again

Manny Diaz used to be known as a defensive mastermind. A former DC for the Texas Longhorns, Miami Hurricanes, and Penn State Nittany Lions, the current Duke head coach was supposed to be able to stop anything that came his way.

So far this season, and less than halfway through the Blue Devils' Week 4 game against the NC State Wolfpack, Diaz was proving that to be false.

As the Wolfpack quickly scored two touchdowns, taking less than 10 minutes off the play clock, fans immediately started questioning what Duke was doing on the defensive side of the ball and their head coach.

For someone who spent nearly two decades working his way through college football as a defensive coordinator, Diaz has fallen well short of success when it comes to building up the Blue Devil defense.

Through the first 22 minutes of the game, Duke allowed NC State 205 yards as Wolfpack quarterback CJ Bailey picked apart the Blue Devils' secondary and connected with seven different targets downfield.

Meanwhile, the offense struggled to find consistency on the other side of the ball, not giving the defense much of a break. Duke quarterback Darian Mensah completed just half of his first eight pass attempts for a minimal 56 yards and zero touchdowns.

With six minutes until halftime, the Blue Devils already trailed 21-7, and it didn't look like things were going to turn around anytime soon.

Highlighting the poor defensive play of the first half, the Blue Devils couldn't even recover a fumble that they forced to pop out of freshman wide receiver Tedd Hoffman's hands.

Even though the Duke football program has seen a lot of growth over the last few years, it hasn't taken long for Diaz to turn things in the opposite direction. The head coach took over in 2024 and has since gone 10-6, with this game rapidly heading down a bad path.

NC State's game plan wasn't complicated, as one fan pointed out, the Wolfpack was really just running screen plays and throwing short passes, then blowing past the secondary to earn yards after the catch.