Chase Brice: We Clicked Last Week, This Week We Finished

Chase Brice earned his first win as a starting quarterback when Duke beat Syracuse 38-24 on Saturday. Brice passed for 270 yards and two touchdowns—his first two to wide receivers while at Duke.

“I think a lot of it is the chemistry I’ve developed with our receivers, tight ends, O-line, running backs,” he said. “When you don’t have a lot of time in the offseason. This amount of time we’re getting is really beneficial to me and the whole team as well. I thought we really clicked last week, and this week, we finished. I’m super proud of them.”

Brice was helped by Duke’s running backs, who gained 363 yards on the ground.

“The run game was tremendous tonight,” he said. “The o-line were moving the pile and making holes. The running backs had great vision, and they hit it fast. When they hit it, they’re going to run and break tackles. It wasn’t an emphasis to run the ball, but in every game, we want to be able to run the ball. It opens things up, gets us in a rhythm and flow. We did a great job of that tonight.”

Brice had one interception and also fumbled while being sacked. Syracuse recovered the fumble and returned it for a go-ahead touchdown. Brice was pulled from the game for a series, replaced by backup Gunnar Holmberg.

“We spotted them seven,” Brice said. “Me. I spotted them seven. I can’t do that. I can’t pull up like that, when we’re on the run. They got to me. I just wasn’t thinking straight. When Gunnar got to go in, I’m the biggest fan on the sideline. I want him to do well, as well. When I got to go in, I settled down. I think I had a lot of emotion, nerves. I wasn’t really playing my kind of ball. In the second half, and when I got to go back in, I settled down and we got things going.”