There is nothing in this world so awful as hope.
Duke entered Saturday's game at Wallace Wade Stadium as an enormous underdog to the Florida State Seminoles.
But then something entirely unexpected happened. The Blue Devils came out and took control of the game. Both the offensive and defensive lines controlled the line of scrimmage, and Duke held a 6-3 lead.
But the punting team managed to undo over a quarter's worth of work in under two minutes.
With just over 12 minutes remaining in the half, Duke set up to punt on its 32 yard line. The snap was on target, but freshman punter Trey McDonald fumbled the ball. This set off a mad scramble that would end when Michael Boulware fell on the ball on the Blue Devil two yard line.
"He dropped the snap," coach Carl Franks said. "He was a freshman out there, and he made some glaring freshman mistakes."
Florida State took a 10-6 lead, and the Duke offense went back onto the field. After an incompletion on third-and-seven at the 24 yard line, the punt team went back onto the field with 10:29 left in the half.
McDonald hung onto the ball this time, but the line didn't pick up Jerome Carter, who blocked the punt and recovered the ball for the touchdown.
"It looked like we had some miscues up front," Franks said. "Somebody probably blocked the wrong way. We could have had someone get out of their lane. They've always been a great punt-block team, one that comes after it. We knew that, but we weren't able to execute our assignments."
There was well over a half a football game to play after the block, but the game was all but over.
"When I knew we were going to have a lot of problems was after we dropped the snap and had one blocked," Franks said. "The kicking game can hurt you fast. It turned the momentum on us in a hurry. Our guys kept playing, but it wasn't the same game after that."
The offense had little success for the remainder of the game, plagued by dropped balls and overthrown passes.
"Once they got the momentum off those two kicks, we started pressing and couldn't get the momentum back," quarterback D. Bryant said. "The momentum swing rocked us, and we couldn't get back on top. A team like Florida State, you get them going, and it might be lights out."
The punting game continued to kill the Blue Devils in the second half. McDonald, whose first punt traveled 51 yards in the air, didn't recover from the block. His shortest punt of the afternoon traveled only 15 yards.
"He shanked a couple," Franks said. "He got a little shaky for a while. Once it got going I just had to go over and put my arm around him. I think he'll be fine. Hopefully, he got that stuff out of the way."
The punting team gave up its second touchdown of the afternoon in the third quarter when Kyler Hall blocked a punt into the endzone where it was recovered by Gennaro Jackson, putting the Seminoles ahead 38-6.
Franks was quick to note that while his punter did not have a banner day, he was not responsible for the two blocks.
"His times getting the ball off were fine," Franks said. "There were some glaring breakdowns. The punting game is an important part of the game, and we are going to fix it."
For the time being, however, the Blue Devils will have to lament the graduation of first-team All-ACC punter Brian Morton, and wonder what might have been.
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