Biggest offensive takeaways from Duke football's win at Middle Tennessee State
By Hugh Straine
Duke football cruised to a 45-17 victory at Middle Tennessee State yesterday, which included an almost two-hour weather delay. We've been waiting to see the Blue Devil offense be able to remain consistent through four quarters, as it's struggled with dry periods without scoring through the first two games of the season. Yesterday, we saw the full potential of what this Duke offense can be. Here are the biggest takeaways from yesterday's offensive onslaught.
Maalik Murphy is the real deal
Murphy came into his first season in Durham as the expected starter and with a lot of excitement around his name. The Texas transfer was oozing with talent, but we saw early on in the season it was going to take a few games for Murphy to get acclimated to Jonathan Brewer's air-raid scheme. As each game passes, Murphy has looked more and more comfortable and confident in the pocket and played one of his best halves of the season in yesterday's first half. He finished the game with 216 yards passing with three touchdowns (all in the first half) and an interception. On the season, he is completing 64% of his passes for 1,017 yards (sixth in ACC) and eleven touchdowns (third in ACC). Murphy is one of six quarterbacks in the conference with over a thousand yards passing and this is now his third straight game with three passing touchdowns. With each game, we see Murphy looking deep and making big plays more often. He connected with tight end Nicky Dalmolin for a 71-yard score on Duke's first possession of the game and connected with wide receiver Jordan Moore later on for another 34-yard touchdown pass. As Murphy continues to build off of these performances, he can lead this offense toward the top of the ACC.
Maalik Murphy - Jordan Moore connection
Although we've seen more targets emerge in this offense as weeks pass, such as the rises of Dalmolin and freshman wideout Que'Sean Brown, Moore has consistently been the prime threat of this offense with his contested-catch ability and skills of handling the deep ball. Moore is leading Duke with 24 receptions, nine more than the next receiver, and leads the team with 340 receiving yards. Despite Moore's lone catch in yesterday's game coming by way of a 34-yard touchdown grab, he's averaged seven catches per game and has two games of over one hundred yards receiving. Moore is also fourth in the ACC in receiving yards and third in touchdown receptions with three. The graduate student has not only proven to be the top target in this Duke offense, but one of the scariest deep ball threats in the entire conference with how he can break free in the open field. Duke hasn't had a thousand-yard receiver in over a decade, and Moore is looking the part of a weapon that will be able to break that streak come the season's end.
The running attack is now a legitimate threat
Through the first two games of the season, Duke struggled to establish a run game and relied on the pass heavily, which especially became a problem in third-down situations. This was part of why Duke ranked towards the bottom of the ACC in third down conversion percentage, but we've seen New Mexico State transfer back Star Thomas emerge as the leader in this backfield and a consistent threat on the ground. After Jaquez Moore was injured early in Duke's second win at Northwestern, Thomas came in and took the bulk of the work. He's had two games as the solo back and has delivered each week with over a hundred yards rushing in both games. Thomas has had 22 and seventeen carries respectively across the last two games, and Moore never eclipsed those numbers through his career. Thomas is proving to be a three-down back that can take on a big load and still produce. Through his two seasons at New Mexico State, Thomas only had one game with over a hundred rushing yards. In his first two games as the lead back for the Blue Devils, he's hit that mark both times while averaging six yards per carry. He also never had a season with more than three touchdowns, and scored the first two of his Duke career yesterday. Duke was still relatively inefficient on third down yesterday, converting three of ten attempts, but with a big-time threat in the backfield, that gives Brewer options to hand the ball off instead of passing like the system almost always calls for, especially in third-and-short situations.
Duke opens up ACC play against rival North Carolina next week, and as this offense continues to get better and deeper each week, it has a chance to make a big statement with an in-conference win next weekend.