If anything was learned from the disappointing 38-24 loss to Wake Forest at Wallace Wade Saturday, it was that the Duke defense is no Energizer Bunny, it eventually stops going.
After failing to score in their first five possessions in the second half, and turning the ball over on three of those drives, the Demon Deacons offense found success on the ground against an obviously fatigued Duke front line and rode their rushing attack to the win.
"[The defense] was just on the field it seemed like the whole second half, sooner or later, it wore on [them]," coach Fred Goldsmith said. "That's what we were hoping to do to them, but we stayed on the field too long, and finally it caught up to us.
"I was proud of those kids, we kept turning them back, turning 'em back. There's only so long you can keep turning 'em back when you're throwing [the ball] and no time is running off the clock, and you're right back in the ballgame."
On their last two drives of the game, not including the final kneel-down, Wake running backs Morgan Kane, Herman Lewis and Kito Gary carried the ball a combined nine times for 75 yards. Even when the Duke defense expected the Deacons to run the ball, it failed to make crucial stops, allowing Lewis to scamper 37 yards down the far sideline to set up the final touchdown with under three minutes left.
During times in the second half, Wake quarterback Brian Kuklick directed a no-huddle offense which had an obvious effect on a Duke defense which was scrambling to put the right personnel in the right places.
While the personnel might not have been the best Duke could offer, the Wake Forest offense certainly wasn't the best out there either. Nevertheless, the unproven Deac running backs ran circles around the Duke front seven, often finding open field on simple runs up the middle.
"It's just straight power football, it's not something we haven't seen before," linebacker Brian Krenzel said. "When we got aggressive on the pass, that's when they started sneaking the runs in. Then they just gained confidence from it, and they executed and made their blocks."
Of course, making those blocks and evading those safeties becomes much easier when the defense is having trouble getting oxygen, let alone shedding blockers and tackling to the ball carrier.
"I wasn't that tired, but I know our big men were pretty tired," cornerback Tawambi Settles said. "I could see them gasping for air. We were out there on the field for a majority of the game, so I think [fatigue] did have something to do with [the defense's ineffectiveness]."
Although Duke's offense held the ball for over 19 minutes in the first half, the Deacons turned the tables on the Blue Devils in the second half, winning the time of possession battle by a whopping 8:54 margin. For the half, Wake ran a total of 52 offensive plays to Duke's 31 and outgained the Blue Devil offense, 264 yards to just 88.
However, if the fatigue did not doom the defense, then certainly the injuries, namely strong safety Darius Clark's ankle sprain, did. With Clark out, redshirt freshman Luke Roush and converted cornerback Alonzo Moyer filled in.
"They really exploited [Clark's] absence," Settles said. "Alonzo and Luke did a good job with the pass, and they did a pretty good job with the run, but they caught us early with some reads that they are not used to making, because they haven't been playing that position for that long. They had only a week, and just to get ready for their passing game is hard. But it's not [long enough] for them to get acclimated to the run."
The inexperience of Moyer and Roush was evident, as Wake's rushing offense, ranked last in the Atlantic Coast Conference coming into this week, produced two 140-yard rushers for the game in Lewis and Kane and churned out 309 yards overall, its season best by 158 yards.
It did not take long for the Wake running attack to began its explosion, as Lewis blasted through the line on a counter trap and went 55 yards untouched to put the Deacs on the board with five minutes left in the first quarter. The Duke defense surrendered five runs of over 25 yards in the game.
"I wouldn't say [the poor run defense] was because of [Clark's absence], but I know those long runs were plays he would've made," Settles said. "I'm not saying Alonzo and [Roush] didn't play a good game, but the reads are not natural unless you play the position a lot.
"Darius is a two-year vet at that position, those reads he would've made easily. Alonzo just didn't make those reads or something was keeping him from getting there."
For a defense that had made so much improvement over the last six quarters (the Virginia game and the second half against Florida), surrendering 38 points to a Wake Forest team certainly cannot be uplifting.
"That's very frustrating that we couldn't have a solid offense day and a solid defense day at the same time," linebacker Chike Egbuniwe said. "Last week, after the game, we are thinking the offense can play better than that, and now this week we're thinking our defense can play better than that. That's frustrating."
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