It was a tough weekend, and it's a tough road ahead.
The recent matches for the men's and women's soccer teams were difficult, but things will not get much easier. Both squads will play games at Davidson on Wednesday.
The fourth-ranked men (5-2) are coming off a Sunday loss to Atlantic Coast Conference rival Clemson, 3-1. Duke played an intense game in losing to the Tigers.
The Blue Devils will have to continue playing hard against a quick-paced and spirited Davidson squad when the teams take the field at 7 p.m.
"Davidson is a very high-pressure team," Duke head coach John Rennie said. "They sub a lot of players to keep themselves fresh. We have to be ready to combat their intensity."
Last season the teams played to a 0-0 tie in Durham. But Rennie expects some changes this time around.
"Davidson's a different team this year," Rennie said. "They're playing without Rob Ukrop."
Ukrop was an All-American and led the Wildcats to an NCAA final four appearance last year, where they were beaten in the national semifinals.
However, Davidson should still pose problems for the Blue Devils. Even without Ukrop, the Wildcats have demonstrated that they are competitive. They recently defeated UNC-Charlotte, a team that beat Clemson earlier this season.
So they are a good team.
But more than that, they are an extremely tough team to play on their home field, as the Blue Devils may well learn. Because Davidson has no football team, soccer is the prime sport.
The crowds are large and loud. Duke senior tri-captain A.J. Siebeneck said the fans might play a factor at the onset of the game, but Duke needs to concentrate on the game and not the chanting fans.
"It should be a tough test for us," he said. "We need to win to maintain our ranking in the south."
That ranking plays a large part in receiving an NCAA tournament bid, so this is an big game. The ACC is as tough as ever, so the Blue Devils can't afford many setbacks out of the conference. The early loss to Clemson will not hurt the Blue Devils too much if they can regroup and come back strong against Davidson.
The women, on the other hand, are coming off a physical 3-2 win over Central Florida on Sunday. They will take on Davidson at 4 p.m. this afternoon.
Last year, the Blue Devils (4-1) beat the Wildcats 6-1, but Duke was only up 1-0 at halftime.
"They had a lapse where we scored five goals in ten minutes," coach Bill Hempen said. "I don't expect that to happen this time."
The women will have to play intense, yet controlled soccer. This is something they've shown in spurts this season, but they need to carry this through the entire 90 minutes.
Hempen and the Blue Devils know what it's like to have a lapse. Last Saturday, Duke played without spirit or emotion and lost 2-0 to Washington. The women came back on Sunday to down Central Florida.
"One thing that came out of this weekend was that we learned how much of a difference attitude makes," junior striker Meegan McMullin said.
Duke will look to use last weekend's events as a learning experience. The team realizes it must play as intensely as it did against Central Florida.
"Against Central Florida we played a high-pressure game -- if we're going to win we have to continue to do that," Hempen said.
McMullin is looking forward to today's encounter.
"The more physical we play, the more dangerous we are offensively," she said.
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