Manny Diaz proud of how his team handled adversity against UConn

Duke football escaped with a 26-21 victory over the Connecticut Huskies on Saturday night to improve to 3-0 on the season. After a strong start offensively that got the Blue Devils to out to a 17-0 lead early on in the second quarter, the offense went cold and found itself in a 21-17 deficit early in the third quarter.

In his press conference ahead of Duke's next matchup against Middle Tennessee State on the road, head coach Manny Diaz touched on the way his team handled adversity after being somewhat punched in the face after such a strong start to the game.

"I'm proud of the way we played in the fourth quarter. All year long, we have not surrendered a touchdown in the fourth quarter...which is a testament to our strength program. I think our guys really believe that...We started very well...But we have to find a way to be consistent over four quarters and that's been the message of 'can we sustain our attention, our focus, and our level of play over the course of four quarters.'"

Duke has had a couple of late-game surges to come away with wins after struggling to find offensive consistency throughout a good part of games. Diaz talked about the mental toughness of his team and how excited he was with how the team continues to focus on the next possession and not focus on its struggles early on.

"I think it's responding to adversity, right? So, it's hard to quantify, right? But when you see the examples of what happened to us at Northwestern, and you go out there and make sudden change stops. You see the way that we flipped it after it got away from us, and we flipped it against Connecticut. I mean, those are real things that our guys can say, 'we did that,' and the ability to do hard things repeatedly."

The confidence and chemistry in the locker room is for sure at a high right now after two straight late comeback wins to help the Blue Devils stay undefeated on the season. But, it was different against Connecticut. Duke had been slow offensively in both of its first two games of the season, and had nothing going at all on the offensive end until the fourth quarter against Northwestern. Against Connecticut, it found itself in a hole after having a 17-point lead near halftime. Diaz harped on how proud of his team he is after getting hit hard for the first time.

"I think we kind of got knocked off our rocker a little bit on those two drives (against Connecticut) and it was good for us to see how we respond to that. That's what we really didn't get at Northwestern. Northwestern, the defense really felt like they probably had control of the majority of the game, until that drive in overtime. That's the first time somebody had kind of stung us a little bit. We had to fight back and I'm proud of how they did it."

The Duke defense has been dominant over the beginning of this season, but got tested for the first time against Connecticut a few nights ago. Defensive coordinator Jonathan Patke had to deliver a message to his unit after it got hit in the nose for the first time all season.

"It took fourteen points for us to get off our heels and wake up. And what the guys realized, and what they'll start to realize even more and more, is that all you have to do is play really hard, tackle really well, and do your job. No matter what's going on in the game. No matter what's happening on the other side of the ball, no matter what's happening on special teams, do your job to the best of your ability. So I think the message was clear after that, and the guys settled in, and I love how we have a resilient group."

Duke looks to improve to 4-0 on the road at Middle Tennessee State on September 21st.

Read highlights from the press conferences here.