David Cutcliffe on Zac Roper's New Role

Former offensive coordinator will coach quarterbacks

David Cutcliffe announced that he’ll be running the offense and calling plays for Duke next season.

Zac Roper had that responsibility last season, as the team’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach. Cutcliffe explained how the roles for the offensive coaches would change.

“It’s going to all be basically the same with them,” he said. “I’m going to continue to have Zac coach the Quarterbacks. Everybody else will keep their positions. Trooper (Taylor) is going to be with receivers. Jeff (Faris) will be with tight ends. Re (Re’quan Boyette) will take running backs.”

While Cutcliffe just announced the change on National Signing Day, it’s been in the works internally for more than a month.

“I think it’s been kind of fun for everybody in there,” he said. “We’re not going to reinvent the wheel, but we’ve taken a whole new approach to how we’re going to do it—the way I’ve always put an offense together and put it in. I’m excited about that. We’ve got a great deal of our spring install already done. We met—I’ve know this for awhile, so we started meeting when we came back, when recruiting was dead. So we’re grinding this out right now.”

While Cutcliffe is calling plays, it will still be a group effort.

“Nobody as an individual is going to run an offense, defense or special teams,” he said. “It will be a staff. None of us individually are as smart as all of us collectively. …It’s going to be exciting. What we come out with—it all has to be pretty simple with me. I’m not smart enough to do too much. I just hope we do it well.”