The Blue Devils do not know very much about West Virginia-but they do know that the Mountaineers will come to play.
Fifth-ranked Duke (3-1-0) squares off against No. 13 West Virginia (3-1-0) 7 p.m. Saturday in Koskinen Stadium. It will be the first meeting between the two teams in over two decades.
"We don't know anything about them," Duke coach John Rennie said. "We've not played them, so we don't really have a feel for how they play.... But they don't really know what we're like either, so it's kind of an even thing there in that first half."
The Blue Devils do know that West Virginia is a very talented team. The Mountaineers beat then-No. 6 Maryland on the road Sept. 7. They are also aware that West Virginia's games tend to be low-scoring-all four of its contests this season have had a final score of 1-0.
"They're obviously very capable of shutting out their opponents," goalkeeper Justin Papadakis said. "So we're going to have to bring a strong offensive game."
Duke's defense-potentially bolstered by the return of senior co-captain Tim Jepson-may be even more critical than the offense against the Mountaineers. The Blue Devils know it will be difficult to score many goals, so they will need to keep West Virginia off the scoreboard as well.
"It's absolutely huge," Jepson said of having a strong defensive effort. "Every game, we've got to prepare for playing the best team.... You've got to have your back four on the same page every game. You've got to be tight, you've got to be solid."
Although Duke has not yet seen the Mountaineers' style of play other than on film, it knows that West Virginia will come out attacking and ready to play. The less talented teams that the Blue Devils played earlier in the season, Valparaiso and Villanova, both employed a defensive strategy.
"When you play teams that are a little bit weaker than us, they tend to sit in and play defense and hope to steal a goal from you," Jepson said. "When you play teams, pretty much anybody in the ACC or the top 10, 15 teams in the country, they actually want to play and so the flow of the game is a lot better, and it's just a much better game of soccer."
And if Duke knows one thing, it is that the Mountaineers will not be like Valparaiso or Villanova-they are coming to Durham to play with the Blue Devils, not to steal a game from them. That will be the case for much of the rest of the season as Duke gets into the heart of its schedule, playing more ranked teams and getting into its conference slate.
The game continues a stretch of four consecutive games in which the Blue Devils will play three ranked teams-including the ACC opener against Maryland Sept. 22.
"It's more valuable to play teams that are going to come in and play," Rennie said. "We'd really rather play those kind of teams-and usually those kind of teams are ranked, so that's fine. That's good."
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.