Tag: Anthony Dilweg

Maalik Murphy needs just three more passing touchdowns to break a Duke football record

With two more passing touchdowns against NC State on Saturday, Maalik Murphy sits on the doorstep of a Duke football record.

Despite a midseason slump, it looks like redshirt sophomore [autotag]Maalik Murphy[/autotag] might break a Duke football record in his first season with the program.

Thanks to his two passing touchdowns against the NC State Wolfpack on Saturday, the former Texas Longhorn now has 22 for the season, just two short of Anthony Dilweg’s single-season record of 24 that has stood since 1988.

Murphy started the season on a torrid pace, throwing multiple touchdowns in every non-conference game to give him 11 through four contests. He only found the end zone three times in the next three games, but Murphy stacked two more three-touchdown games against SMU and Miami to reach 20 after Week 10.

He hit star senior Jordan Moore for a 45-yard score in the first quarter of Saturday’s 29-19 win, and his nine-yard touchdown throw to Sahmir Hagans gave Duke a 14-point lead at the start of the fourth quarter.

Dilweg’s single-season yardage record of 3,824, also set in 1988, looks out of reach for Murphy, who has only accumulated 2,366 through 10 games. With 634 combined yards against Virginia Tech, Wake Forest, and a potential bowl opponent, Murphy would put together the seventh 3,000-yard season in school history.

Maalik Murphy becomes ninth Duke quarterback with 20 passing touchdowns in a season

Maalik Murphy’s three passing touchdowns against Miami moved him into a tie for the fourth-most in a single season in Duke history.

Duke quarterback [autotag]Maalik Murphy[/autotag] lit up the scoreboard again on Sunday against the Miami Hurricanes despite the loss.

The redshirt sophomore finished with 325 yards and three touchdowns, and as a result, he moved into a tie for the fourth-most passing touchdowns in a single season in school history.

Murphy’s performance gave him 20 touchdowns for the season, a mark only eight other Blue Devils quarterbacks have matched in one year.

The former Texas Longhorn has thrown for 2,121 yards, 20 touchdowns, and eight interceptions through nine games this season. While he turned the ball over four times, his three-touchdown day helped Duke put up 31 points against the Hurricanes, the team’s best total against a Power Four opponent.

Murphy now sits alongside names like Ben Bennett (1982), Steve Slayden (1987), Thaddeus Lewis (2009), and Riley Leonard (2022). The three quarterbacks still ahead of him are, in order, Anthony Dilweg (who threw 24 in 1988), Daniel Jones (22 in 2018), and Thaddeus Lewis (21 in 2007).

With three games remaining on Duke’s schedule for the regular season, plus a likely bowl game, Murphy will have a great chance to take Dilweg’s record for himself. Duke will play NC State, Virginia Tech, and Wake Forest for those three games.

Maalik Murphy remains well ahead of pace for this Duke football record

He’s only played four games with the Duke Blue Devils, but quarterback Maalik Murphy is nearly halfway to this single-season school record.

Duke quarterback [autotag]Maalik Murphy[/autotag] is going to break the school record for single-season passing touchdowns at some point this year.

The first-year starter finished with 216 yards and three touchdowns against Middle Tennessee on Saturday, his third straight game with three touchdown passes. The former Texas Longhorn has now put 11 scoring passes on the board through four games, nearly halfway to the single-season school record.

Anthony Dilweg threw 24 touchdown passes back in 1988, a total no Blue Devils quarterback has matched in the 36 years since. In fact, a Duke starting quarterback has only thrown for 20 touchdowns in a single season eight times.

As of Sunday morning, Murphy would finish the 12-game regular season with 33 passing touchdowns. He wouldn’t just break Dilweg’s record at this pace, he’d break it with three full games left to play.

Murphy has also thrown for 1,017 yards through four games, putting him on pace for 3,051 passing yards at the end of the regular season. That’d be the sixth-highest total in Duke history. The Blue Devils clearly want to live through the air, evidenced by 143 pass attempts through Week 4, and that gives the former four-star prospect plenty of room to rewrite Blue Devils history.

Murphy and his Duke teammates host a North Carolina defense that just gave up more than 600 total yards and five passing touchdowns to James Madison next Saturday to open the conference schedule.

Duke quarterback Maalik Murphy is on pace to shatter this Blue Devils record

Through his first three games, Duke quarterback Maalik Murphy is on pace to absolutely destroy this school record.

If any Duke football fans think that first-year starting quarterback [autotag]Maalik Murphy[/autotag] has already thrown a lot of touchdown passes in 2024, the school record books absolutely prove them right.

Murphy threw three touchdowns against the Connecticut Huskies on Saturday night, his second consecutive game with three scoring throws. He found the end zone twice against Elon in Week 1, giving him eight passing touchdowns through three games.

The Duke single-season passing touchdown record is 24, set by Anthony Dilweg in 1988. Murphy’s current pace would give him 32 touchdown passes by the end of the regular season. In fact, if he only throws two touchdown passes per game for the rest of the season, he would still break Dilweg’s mark with 26 for the year.

Two of his first three starts came against Elon and UConn, but he also took down a Power Four program on the road in Week 2. Northwestern finished 15th in the country in passing yards allowed last season, and the former Texas Longhorn ended up with 243 yards against the Wildcats.

Dilweg also owns the school’s single-season passing yards record with 3,824, but that one looks pretty safe. Murphy has thrown for 801 yards through three games, giving him a 12-game pace of 3,204 yards. Even with a bowl game, he’d only get to 3,471 yards, although that would leave him second on the all-time list.

Assuming the touchdown passes keep rolling, however, Murphy will carve his place in the school record books.