It took more than four quarters for the Duke football team to walk away with a win in Week 2, but the Blue Devils bring nothing but momentum back to Wallace Wade Stadium.
After a slow start, quarterback [autotag]Maalik Murphy[/autotag] completed 17 of his last 23 passes and threw touchdowns on both of Duke’s overtime possessions, leading a frantic comeback effort to keep his new team undefeated. Wide receiver [autotag]Jordan Moore[/autotag] kept his march to 1,000 yards going with a second consecutive 100-yard game, this time corralling 11 passes for 121 yards, and linebacker Alex Howard finished with 14 total tackles and 2.5 tackles for loss.
Now, the Blue Devils play another basketball powerhouse in Connecticut. While the Huskies blew out Merrimack for a 63-17 victory last weekend, they got their doors blown off against Maryland in Week 1 and sport an 11-28 record since 2021.
Can Manny Diaz’s squad keep it rolling for a third straight win? Here are our predictions.
Ryan Haley, Duke Wire site editor
The big question for this game is whether the fourth quarter and overtime version of Maalik Murphy was him settling into the offense or just a hot streak against favorable defensive looks.
Offensive coordinator Jonathan Brewer finally found a way to speed up the game on those final four drives, and Duke gained 165 of its 343 offensive yards on those four possessions. After spending the first three quarters making delayed reads and firing indecisive balls into traffic, Murphy looked sure of himself and diagnosed the right option on almost every dropback. It felt like the approach boiled down to ‘Look at Jordan Moore first on every play,’ and that should probably be the starting point moving forward.
It’s reasonable to assume that the comeback victory gives the former Texas Longhorn an injection of confidence in the pocket, but his first seven quarters were a bit too up-and-down for that to be a sure thing.
Connecticut showed a much-needed sign of life against Merrimack in Week 2, but the Huskies still don’t feel very fearsome after the 50-7 loss to Maryland. I’ll choose to be optimistic about Murphy’s development, especially against this secondary, and he keeps going downhill on Saturday.
Duke 38, UConn 13
Bryant Crews, Staff Writer
Duke’s thrilling win against Northwestern on the road is the stuff that should galvanize a team to go on a run of incredible football. Who knows if that ends up being the case, but for Saturday against a UConn team that just put up 63 points on Merrimack, Duke needs to come out a lot faster than they did in Chicago.
One would imagine a major point of emphasis this week in Durham is the run game. Duke looked putrid running the ball. Maryland ran for almost 250 yards on this same Huskies team. There are plays to be had there.
In the end, I think Duke’s just got too much talent at the skill positions to lose. Maalik Murphy tosses three more touchdown passes, Jacquez Moore adds another on the ground and we see Henry Belin IV get some action.
Duke 41, UConn 28