Chase Brice on Playing With No Fans: We'll Have to Bring Our Own Juice

Duke’s home opener will not have a home crowd. Pandemic restrictions prevent any fans or students from coming to the game against Boston College. It will be the Blue Devils’ first experience playing in those conditions. An estimated 16,000 were at the opener at Notre Dame.

“Yeah, that’ll be different,” quarterback Chase Brice said.

Of course, Brice has no idea what it’ll be like.

“I’m not really sure,” he said. “It’s never happened before. I’ve never played a game where there’s no fans. I’m sure it’ll be a little bit of an adjustment pregame. You’re going to have to bring your own juice and level of intensity. You’re not going to have fans behind you, but that’s just kind of what it is. It is what it is. You just deal with it and play the game.”

Duke will look to build off a strong performance in a loss at Notre Dame in the opener.

“On the road at Notre Dame, that’s a tough first game, but that’s the draw we got,” Brice said. “We’re going to build so much off of what we saw on film. A lot of improvement comes from the first game to the second game. That’s going to be the goal moving into this week, going into Boston College. That’s the plan. We’re going to play better.”

Duke also got a confidence boost from playing close with No. 10 Notre Dame.

“We can play with anybody that lines up in front of us,” Brice said, “and I think people saw that.”