Five Questions About Duke Answered by Blue Devils Beat Writer

Cal (4-1, 1-0 ACC) hosts Duke (3-2, 2-0 ACC) in a Saturday night game this week, so to get to know the Blue Devils a little better we asked Conor O’Neill of Devils Illustrated to answer five questions about Duke.

We provide written excerpts of his answers, but you may want to view each video to get his entire perspective:

---1. Duke running back Nate Sheppard made his first start against Syracuse and rushed for 168 yards. Are you surprised by Sheppard’s emergence, and what is your impression of his ability?

“I think anytime you have a freshman who’s in his fifth game of his career and he’s already starting, and putting up that kind of performance, it’s going to be surprising, especially when you factor in it was an ACC road game.

“[But] It’s not like a freshman we didn’t hear about, even in recruiting circles. He could have been a flip target for a lot of bigger schools last year with the high school season he was having [but] he broke a bone in his leg in late October, and I think that scared off – the one that was really on the trail was Ole Miss and Lane Kiffin.”

O’Neill notes that Sheppard was an early enrollee so he had six months to get used to the offense.

“His skill set, he’s listed at 5-10, 200 pounds, which isn’t small . . . [but] he runs a lot bigger than his size tells you he is. He seems to have a good mix of vision with speed and strength, he sets up block really well, he’s got breakaway speed, he had a 49-yard touchdown run against Syracuse.

“You would think that Anderson Castle, the big, burly running back, you would think he would be the yards-after-contact leader, [but] Nate Sheppard actually has the edge in yards after contact, according to Pro Football Focus.”

---2. Quarterback Darian Mensah is second in the ACC in passer rating and first in the conference among active players in passing yards per game. What does Mensah do well and what impact has he had on the team’s success? And did Duke really agree to pay him $8 million over two years?

“My understanding is it is a two-year contract worth up to $8 million. It means that if he wins the Heisman this year, yes, he’ll make $4 million. . . . It’s incentive-laden, and there are performance benchmarks in there.”

“He’s worth whatever they’re paying him; he’s been fantastic, everything that this offense wants to have: He’s mobile, he’s able to keep plays alive with his legs. He scrambles to throw, he does not scramble to run. He still might have negative rushing yards on the season. . . . Maalik Murphy [last year’s starter now at Oregon State] did not do that last year for this team; he was a pocket passer in every sense of the word.”

“What Darian has been able to do in these first five games, he’s been so impressively distributing the ball . . . He spreads the wealth. It helps that they have multiple weapons that he can use.”

“He is a precision passer, the accuracy has been excellent so far.”

“He fits what Duke needs in a quarterback, and Duke fits what he needs from the system they run.”

---3. Is Duke still a basketball school, or has football moved up to be on par with basketball in the minds of fans and students?

“It’s always going to be a basketball school. . . But what there is, is the understanding that it can’t be just a basketball school. They have to be more invested in football if they want to still have a seat at the table in whatever realignment looks like in the next several years or couple decades.

“It really goes back to the decision to hire Mike Elko [prior to the 2022 season] . . . and it’s kind of extended down the line to Manny Diaz. They lost Mike because there’s only so much you can commit to the football program, you’re still not going to be able to convince him that it’s going to be worth it for him to stay there compared to an SEC school that can give you the type of money and resources that Texas A&M can. [Elko is now Texas A&M’s head coach.]

“But there’s more of a cohesion than there was maybe 10 years ago. . . . They know they need to be consistently good in the money-driving sport of college athletics.”

---4. Assess the job that Manny Diaz has done as head coach.

“Right now I think his record at Duke is 12-5.”

O’Neill had said he thought Duke would always be a team that would play close games but never dominate an opponent under Diaz, “and they go out and win at Syracuse 38-3.”

“He has done a great job of continuing the ascension. This was a program that was stuck in the mud at the end of David Cutcliffe’s tenure [in 2021]. . . The turnaround from Cutcliffe to Elko was so fast, and they became such a better program . . . There was concern that someone who turns around the program so quickly leaves after two years . . . [but] They’re stayed on that high trajectory . . . Duke doesn’t have to be this developmental program that is going to be good every three or four years.”

“That’s the most impressive thing to me is the fact that Manny has kept this program rising and there was some doubt whether it still could.”

---5. Who are Duke’s best players on offense and defense?

Besides Mensah and Sheppard, O’Neill mentioned Castle as a short-yardage back. Three wide receivers – Cooper Barkate, Que’Sean Brown and Sahmir Hagans – have been impressive.

Right tackle Brian Parker II may be an NFL player.

Two elite edge rushers in the ACC in Vincent “VJ” Anthony Jr. and Wesley Williams.

Duke’s best player may be Chandler Rivers, a preseason All-American cornerback. “He’s a technically sound corner . . . just been a dynamic cornerback . . . an outstanding cornerback . . . They can leave him out on an island. . . They can kind of shade coverage to the other side.”

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