By beating then-No.3 Southern California last week, the Blue Devils recorded their first win over a team in the top five in three years. This weekend, Duke has a chance to capitalize on its momentum and begin the ACC season strongly. In fact, the Blue Devils have three opportunities to do so.
Duke takes on Harvard at 10 a.m. today and plays its first conference opponent in Boston College at 4 p.m, with both matches taking place at Harvard’s Murr Center in Cambridge, Mass. To round off the weekend, the Blue Devils travel to College Park, Md. for a high noon showdown Sunday against Maryland.
While Duke (6-5) will be attempting to keep up the top form it showed in its win over the Trojans, its three opponents will all be looking to bounce back from losses. To make matters more challenging for the Blue Devils, they will have to take on all three without star freshman and ACC Player of the Week Henrique Cunha, who is out injured with a slight ankle sprain.
“It’s not that bad,” head coach Ramsey Smith said of Cunha’s injury. “It’ll keep him out of the Friday matches, but he’s going to be fine. It’s nothing that’ll take real long to recover.”
Smith is looking at this injury blow positively, viewing Cunha’s absence as a test for the other players to step up and challenge themselves.
“This will give our guys a chance to play higher [seeds],” Smith said. “In the long run, it’ll make us a stronger team if we can get through these matches without him.”
The three matches over the weekend also represent a good chance for the Blue Devils to simulate tournament play. Situations like this one will come up if Duke makes a deep run into either the ACC or NCAA tournaments, where the Blue Devils would play three or four matches in a row with little rest.
Although the Crimson (8-6), the Eagles (8-8) and the Terrapins (13-4) are all ranked below the Blue Devils nationally, Smith stressed the importance of having the right mentality, citing this as the key to his team’s victory over the Trojans.
“I think what we did really well in that last match was that everyone went out there and played to win,” Smith said. “Even though these teams are ranked below us, we need to go out there and assert ourselves early, play aggressive and play to win.”
This is only the beginning of a busy ACC calendar—the Blue Devils play three matches a week until the regular season ends April 18.
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