So close.
The 1938 football team finished the regular season undefeated, untied and unscored upon. The Iron Dukes, as the team was dubbed, earned an invitation to the Rose Bowl, the most prestigious of all bowl games.
Leading 3-0 late in the fourth quarter, the Blue Devils were just over a minute away from immortality. Their place in football lore seemed destined.
But then, when they least expected it, the Iron Dukes finally bent.
Southern Cal's fourth-string quarterback, Doyle Nave, began a drive from the Duke 35-yard line with two minutes to play. With 40 seconds left in the game, he found reserve end Al Krueger for the third straight time, connecting on a 16-yard game-winning touchdown.
Five hundred and 59 minutes of shutout football forever tainted by the 560th.
Duke's publicity director at the time, Tedd Mann, called the Rose Bowl loss "one of the most devastating experiences in my life."
Duke quarterback Eric Tipton, now residing in Williamsburg, Va., still remembers the pain.
"Everyone was saddened," Tipton said. "There were a few tears shed, including mine. It was tough. But playing in the Rose Bowl was a real treat, even though we lost. It was quite an accomplishment for us.... It is something all of us, even to this day, treasure."
The importance of that season cannot be downplayed.
Soon-to-be legendary athletic director Eddie Cameron called it "the turning point for Duke athletics." The Rose Bowl was broadcast on national radio and introduced Duke to millions of people.
"No team has meant more to Duke athletics than your team in 1938," then-athletic director Tom Butters said in a 1988 letter to the squad. "You set a standard of excellence which will probably never again be duplicated. It is your team that created a great football tradition when there was none.... No other group of men has brought Duke University as much recognition as yours."
Football was quite different then. There were no facemasks, players played both ways and only three Blue Devils, and no starters, weighed over 200 pounds
Tipton is aware of his place in history (only two other teams in NCAA history have had unscored upon regular seasons), but what he remembers most is the friendships. Still to this day, the Iron Dukes reunite each year, and when a member of the team dies, 39 roses are sent to the family.
"The thing I remember most is the camaraderie. After 60 years, we still meet each year as long as we can do it," said Tipton, who missed this year's reunion while recovering from a stroke. "We plan to meet again next year."
The 1938 season began with wins over traditional local foes Virginia Polytechnic and Davidson. But the nation began to take notice when the Blue Devils beat a good Georgia Tech team and took out northern schools like Colgate and Syracuse.
But the biggest test was yet to come.
The final game of the season was played in Durham and in a snow storm. The visitor was undefeated Pittsburgh, and the 52,000 fans that would show up for the game represented the largest crowd in Southern football history.
The weather and an injury to running back George McAfee limited Duke's offense, but its punting game was on target. Tipton had 20 punts total, 15 of which landed inside the 20-yard line.
"We never had snow in Duke while we were there," Tipton said. "It started snowing in the morning and by game time it was covered pretty good. We got quite concerned that our unscored upon streak would end.... We felt lucky to get the win."
The game was knotted at zero when finally in the fourth quarter, Willard "Bolo" Perdue blocked a punt and fell on the ball for the game's lone score. Duke escaped with the a 7-0 victory and a Rose Bowl invitation.
As for Perdue, the play might have made him famous, but it's not what his teammates think of first when reminiscing about the glory days.
During one practice, legendary coach Wallace Wade was teaching a few recruits how to fend off charging linemen. Wade asked Perdue to charge him, which Perdue did. But the end went easy on his coach, who at the time was in his 40s.
"Is that as hard as you can charge?" Wade yelled.
Perdue tried again, this time going all-out, and broke four of his coach's ribs.
It was also Perdue who made all the local papers while on Duke's cross-country trip to California. It seems the dashing Blue Devil had quite an affect on one young lady who gave him a pair of her black-lace panties.
The team took four days to cross the country in a chartered train named "The Blue Devil Special." Players kicked balls into the Grand Canyon, toured MGM Studios and, at every stop, were greeted by throngs of fans.
The trip was once-in-a-lifetime.
The game was even better.
"The fans who jammed the huge Rose Bowl got more than they expected," the Raleigh News & Observer reported. "They were treated to a football battle worthy of the setting. Long will they talk about this game, and always the talk of the great play of the Blue Devils will be words of praise."
The game was back-and-forth for the majority of the first three quarters before McAfee returned a punt 26 yards, just past midfield. A brief Blue Devil drive culminated with a 24-yard field goal by "True Toe" Tony Ruffa.
But in the end, it wasn't enough. A lone Trojan touchdown left Duke a 7-3 loser and a historical asterisk.
Wade was devastated, but recognized the accomplishments of his players.
"They made me proud of them," he said. "They played the greatest game any of my teams ever played in the Rose Bowl. I'm sick for their sake. I hate to see a bunch of boys lose who played and fought like they did."
Doyle Nave became the most unlikely of heroes. A fourth-stringer who only played 28 minutes all season-not enough to earn a letter-broke the hearts of thousands in North Carolina.
A few years later during World War II, center Dan Hill ran into Nave, who was serving on a different ship.
"Tell me the truth, Dan, did you guys think I was going to pass when I came in?" Nave asked.
Hill could only respond with the honest truth. He knew that one of the greatest seasons in the history of college football was finished by a complete unknown.
"Hell, Doyle," Hill said, "we didn't even know who you were."
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