A look back: Duke suffers 22-10 loss to Miami

JC Ridley, Duke Sports Information
JC Ridley, Duke Sports Information

MIAMI GARDENS, FLA. – The Duke Blue Devils lost their first game of the season, a 22-10 decision to the Miami Hurricanes at Sun Life Stadium on Saturday.

After the two team’s 12th meeting all-time ended, the Hurricanes had avenged last year’s 48-30 loss to Duke with a commanding defensive performance that limited the Blue Devils to 264 total yards.

It was Duke’s (4-1, 0-1) first Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) game of the season and its toughest test to date – a game that gave Miami (3-2, 1-1) the upper hand in the battle for determining the eventual Coastal Division title.

“That was a really hard fought and physical football game,” Duke head coach David Cutcliffe said.

“We at times played well in all three phases, but we didn’t piece all three phases as well as we normally would together to put ourselves in a position to be successful. Offensively, it was a tough day. I have to give Miami credit—they won a lot of the battles.”

Duke quarterback Anthony Boone (22-51, 179 yards, 2 INT’s) suffered the first regular-season loss of his career, and had trouble with snaps and connecting with his receivers against a swarming Miami defense.

“Definitely improve on throwing and catching and not shooting ourselves in the foot,” Boone said.

“I think we had more negative plays than positive plays, which really hurt us. We would have good drives going and then get called for holding, blocking in back, offsides, and those kind of things will kill us, so we just have to do better. We have a bye week coming up and then we go to Atlanta, so we just need to put this game behind us and keep moving forward.”

Highlights: Miami 22, Duke 10

Though wide receiver Jamison Crowder extended his consecutive games streak with two or more receptions to 33, making seven catches for 47 yards, the senior didn’t have much room to work with against a dynamic Miami defense.

“Miami had a lot of energy tonight,” Crowder said.

“You could definitely tell defensively that they were fired up. A lot of their guys found a way to get to the ball, and they did a great job of game tackling and making plays on the ball. You could definitely tell they had a different energy level than previous games and had a lot of intensity.”

On the ground, running back Shaquille Powell rushed for a season-high 58 yards, and scored his second touchdown of the season, the Blue Devils’ lone run across the goal line in the game.

Freshman running back Shaun Wilson contributed both on the ground and in the air, gaining 31 yards on eight carries and posting a career-high six catches for a team-best 74 yards.

Trailing Miami 9-7 at halftime, Duke couldn’t get its offense to produce more than a Ross Martin field goal with 3:57 remaining in the third quarter.

The Hurricanes managed to keep their distance until the final whistle by scoring touchdowns in each of the final two quarters of play.

Miami quarterback Brad Kaaya threw a 28-yard touchdown pass in the third quarter that was the first scoring pass of the year allowed by a Duke defense that entered the game as one of just six FBS programs to have not allowed an aerial score this season.

The Hurricanes’ final touchdown came at the end of a 66-yard drive that followed an interception on one of Boone’s 51 attempted throws in the game.

While Duke entered the game as one of just seven teams na­tionally averaging 230-plus passing yards and 260-plus rushing yards, Cutcliffe knew that if his team didn’t present a balanced offensive attack, it would be ‘in trouble’ as he stated during his weekly ACC teleconference.

In watching his team experience its first loss, the Duke coach was still proud of the players’ efforts in light of lapses in execution against a tough opponent.

“I’m very proud of our people for continuing to battle,” Cutcliffe stated.

“We fought hard, and on a day when traditionally the better part of our team struggles, we have a chance to win in the fourth quarter. 22-10 final score, but we gave up a few unfortunate plays there defensively. Otherwise, we played just about as good as they could play against a team that has as many weapons as Miami does. We’ll learn from this – nobody is panicking. It’s a loss, and you deal with a loss. We’re going to look at a lot of the little things that didn’t go well and improve upon them. But thank goodness we’re not having to correct effort and attitude – both of those were outstanding. So we’ll build on that and challenge ourselves to grow.”