Duke and Miami football fans will get reminded a few dozen times before Saturday afternoon, but [autotag]Manny Diaz[/autotag] returns to Coral Gables in Week 10.
The first-year Blue Devils head coach, who was born in Miami, spent three seasons as the school’s defensive coordinator before being elevated to the Hurricanes’ head coach in 2019. He finished with a 6-7 record in his first campaign before going 15-8 between the 2020 and 2021 seasons, giving him a 21-15 overall mark and a 16-9 record against ACC opponents.
In one of the more bizarre sagas in recent college football history. however, the Hurricanes strung out the end of his tenure. The school not-so-secretly courted Mario Cristobal, then the coach of the Oregon Ducks, before ultimately firing Diaz on December 6, 2021.
“I am disappointed in the University’s decision and the manner in which this played out over the last few weeks,” Diaz wrote in a statement shared to X, the social media platform then known as Twitter. “I leave very proud of what we were building and the fight we brought every week.”
Miami announced Cristobal as his replacement on the same day.
If Duke football fans want bloodthirsty revenge from the man in charge, however, Diaz did not sound like a man scorned during his Monday press conference.
“There’s a great saying that no man crosses the same river twice for he’s not the same man and it’s not the same river,” Diaz said. “That’s really the way I look at it. I’ve grown, I’m different as a coach, as a head coach, as a man.”
The Blue Devils have certainly benefitted from that growth. Duke won its first five games of the season for the first time in three decades, and Diaz and his team came within a 2-point conversion of upsetting the ranked SMU Mustangs at home on Saturday night.
Diaz, a defensive coach by trade, has his side of the ball absolutely dialed. Under the supervision of defensive coordinator Jonathan Patke, the Blue Devils held an SMU offense averaging more than 40 points per game to just three touchdowns in regulation thanks to six turnovers and a goal-line stand on fourth down.
Duke ranks second among FBS teams in tackles for loss (71), 10th in yards allowed per play (4.55), and 13th in sacks (24).
Cristobal and the Hurricanes, for their part, threw themselves into the heart of the College Football Playoff conversation after winning each of their first eight games. Quarterback Cam Ward is a Heisman favorite after compiling 2,746 yards and 24 touchdowns through the air, leading the Power Four in both categories.
One detail from Diaz’s press conference felt like it summed up the entire idea of a dramatic homecoming. While the Duke coach will answer question after question about being back in Miami, he actually said he owns a place in the area and returns pretty frequently. The three years since his departure have dulled this into another game on the schedule.
“I’m at peace,” Diaz said simply. “I’ve moved on.”