The Duke Blue Devils won in Durham yet again on Saturday night, taking advantage of two early touchdowns from fifth-year wideout Eli Pancol for a 31-28 victory over Virginia Tech.
Pancol, a fifth-year senior playing his final game at Wallace Wade Stadium, made sure every Duke football fan left with a positive memory of his time in Durham. On the Blue Devils’ first offensive snap, he beat the entire Hokies secondary on a post route up the seam. Quarterback Maalik Murphy floated the ball perfectly to catch him in stride, and 86 yards later, Duke led by seven points.
The offense faced its first third down of the evening one possession later. Needing seven yards to move the sticks, Murphy looked well past that for Pancol again. The redshirt sophomore put the ball toward the sideline, letting his target spin around for a back-shoulder grab, but Hokies defensive back Dante Lovett stumbled to the ground as Pancol turned.
The opening left no one between Pancol and the end zone, and he raced the remaining distance to the goal line for a 77-yard score.
Pancol ended the first quarter with 175 yards on three receptions, and he caught a third touchdown with six minutes left in the second quarter. He ended the game with a career-high 188 yards on five catches.
That second-quarter touchdown gave Murphy his 25th scoring pass of the year, breaking a single-season school record that stood since 1988. However, despite Pancol’s monstrous production, it was an up-and-down opening half for the former Texas Longhorn.
After finishing four of his last six games without an interception, Murphy tossed three before the break to let the Hokies back into the ballgame. He gave the ball away to defensive back Dorian Strong on consecutive possessions in the middle of the half, creating two drives that resulted in 10 Virginia Tech points.
Murphy completed six of his first nine passes for 180 yards, but he only connected on four of his last 14 attempts in the half. Outside of a 58-yard catch-and-run connection with senior wideout Jordan Moore, he threw for two yards in the second quarter, and the Blue Devils led just 21-17 when they went to the locker room.
As he’s done over and over again in 2024, however, Duke’s quarterback summoned good football during a critical second-half possession.
With the Blue Devils receiving the ball first, Murphy found redshirt sophomore Que’Sean Brown for completions of 34 and 18 yards as he marched his teammates down the field. He finished that drive four-for-four with 73 yards, and running back Star Thomas finally got a turn in the end zone with a 2-yard score to make it a two-score game just three minutes into the half.
Murphy ended his final home game of the season with a career-high 332 yards, his second 300-yard performance in three games, and he’s thrown 11 touchdowns over the last four.
A game with six combined turnovers will never be described as “calm,” but the scoreboard settled down from there at least. The two teams combined for a single touchdown over the final 26 minutes, and despite a late Thomas fumble that gave the Hokies a last-gasp possession after the two-minute warning, the Blue Devils held on for a 31-28 triumph.
Duke clinched its third straight eight-win season with the result. The Blue Devils travel to Winston-Salem next week for a road game against Wake Forest