Duke head coach David Cutcliffe held his weekly press conference today. Cutcliffe talked about his team’s 28-21 victory against Wake Forest and also the upcoming matchup against North Carolina. Here are some highlights from his 30-minute question and answer session. The Blue Devils play the Tar Heels Saturday at noon at Kenan Stadium.
"If you win a game at a meaningful time of year, the next game gets bigger. So what you end up with is two teams that are on a win streak and playing as well as anyone in the league coming together, and it happens to be a rival game, and it happens to be on a holiday weekend. They were able to kind of write their own story and write their own challenge, and that's what this ultimately is."—Cutcliffe
The Blue Devils will travel eight miles down the road to square off with North Carolina Saturday with the ACC's Coastal Division crown on the line. With the win, Duke will advance to the ACC championship game and a meeting with Florida State. North Carolina can clinch a share of the division title with a victory, but would need some help to make it through to the championship game.
Cutcliffe added that in addition to being a huge conference game, having the Duke-North Carolina rivalry play out on the gridiron gives the contest some added significance.
"Outside of just being Duke and North Carolina you really don't have to to make it a big game. Each year that I've been here, and particularly the first year, I learned more and more about that rivalry," Cutcliffe said. "It's unique, to say the least, just because of the locations of the new schools. It has more meaning, and I think that's a good thing."
"They have a less-experienced quarterback, but you've got a guy who time and again has proven he's going to make plays. He's certainly more of a threat to run the ball than [Bryn] Renner was."—Cutcliffe
After losing starting quarterback Bryn Renner to a shoulder injury, North Carolina has been on a tear with backup Marquise Williams at the helm. The Tar Heels posted 80 points in just three quarters of action against Old Dominion last week, and will look to keep that up-tempo offensive momentum going into this week's matchup with Duke.
"You've got a young man now that can throw the football, is extremely accurate, he's big, he's fast," Cutcliffe said. "He's got a lot of physical skills and has become each week more and more experienced as we've come along."
"I love the challenges of playing on the road and encourage them to embrace that. These are all opportunities to find out who you are, and if you aren't feeling that you're not much of a competitor. You don't want the easy path if you're the type of competitor we want to recruit here."—Cutcliffe
Duke heads on the road this weekend putting its unblemished road record on the line against North Carolina. The Blue Devils are a perfect 4-0 this season with road victories against Memphis, Virginia, Virginia Tech and Wake Forest. This figure presents a stark contrast from last year, when Duke won just once outside of Wallace Wade Stadium.
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