Duke could have tied the game with a field goal in the third quarter on Saturday.
With a little under five minutes left in the frame, the Blue Devils trailed 10-7 and faced a fourth-and-1 from the 9-yard line. Instead of taking the three points, however, head coach [autotag]Manny Diaz[/autotag] weighed how effectively his offense moved the ball down the field (82 yards over the previous 11 plays). He opted for the aggressive play, asking his offense for one more yard to keep the drive churning.
Running back [autotag]Star Thomas[/autotag] took the handoff, but his legs got tangled with quarterback Maalik Murphy. The senior back fell to the ground untouched just behind the line of scrimmage.
After the game, Diaz said the miss felt like the defining play of the game.
“The sad part is, it’s self-inflicted,” Diaz said. “We tripped over each other in the backfield…That’s not unlucky, that’s execution. That’s on us.”
A potential three-point swing doesn’t sound consequential in a game Duke lost by 10, especially considering that the Blue Devils took the lead with a 65-yard touchdown to receiver Sahmir Hagans on the next drive, but what about a seven-point swing? Because Diaz said that, to his eye, the offensive line created a hole for Thomas, and both touchdowns would have given his team a 21-10 lead after three quarters.
“To make that score 11 (after the Hagans touchdown) in our time of ascendancy would have been very important for what they would have come at us with offensively afterward,” Diaz concluded.