This past weekend Duke football lost to the Boston College Eagles 26-6. Let’s break down what went wrong for the Blue Devils this week.
Turnovers
The first thing that went wrong was how much Duke turned the ball over. In the game against Boston College, it had a total of five. Chase Brice was responsible for three of those. He threw two interceptions and had a fumble as well. The other two fumbles came from Deon Jackson and Damond Philyaw-Johnson.
These turnovers lead to Duke’s downfall. The Blue Devils were moving the ball well, but it’s hard to win a game when nearly half of your offensive drives result in turnovers. Duke did a better job with its ball security last week against Notre Dame. This should be a point of emphasis for the Blue Devils in practice this week, as they prepare to play against Virginia. Duke was close to scoring twice but turned the ball over both times. That is just something it can’t do especially, when you are in the red zone.
Running Game
Besides Mataeo Durant, Duke’s running game struggled throughout the game. I think that was the mistake there. Durant scored Duke’s lone touchdown with a 49-yard run in the first quarter. After that Durant was hardly used for the rest of the game.
To be fair to Jackson, the blocking wasn’t always there, but we’ll have to see if Duke will want to give more carries to Durant next week. This has now been a problem for the Blue Devils the past two weeks. They try to get a running game going, it fails and then they give up on it. This doesn’t help the game plan. You need to have a successful running attack to open the rest of your offense.
Chase Brice
Brice can’t be happy with his performance this week after the debut he had against Notre Dame. Brice played well and at times and looked like he was going to blow the game wide open for the Blue Devils, but that just wasn’t the case. The biggest thing I saw from Brice while turning over the ball, was he would often try to force the ball into tight situations.
I would like to see him use his legs more. It would open the passing game more, because he becomes unpredictable and the defenses they play against, would have to commit a defender to play quarterback spy. That’s one less defender Duke’s receivers have to worry about.
Looking forward
Duke has a lot to fix this week in practice. Ball security is the main concern. Duke moved the ball efficiently, but those turnovers took away what should have been a win.
The defense had a solid week. Duke’s turnovers resulted in the defense taking more snaps than it should have. The goals remains the same for the defense, get sacks and force some turnovers. We’ll have to see if Duke comes out strong against Virginia this Saturday.
