Duke runs North Carolina.
In their final regular season game, the Blue Devils engineered a major comeback on the road to take down Wake Forest. Quarterback Maalik Murphy delivered one final strike in his historic first season in Durham, connecting with Jordan Moore as time expired to clinch a 23-17 victory.
“It's like the perfect exclamation point to our season. Who else would it be, other than Jordan Moore? So for him to make that play to get us to nine wins, just an unbelievable way to finish what has really been quite an unbelievable season for us,” head coach Manny Diaz said.
Duke had an opportunity to come through with one more clutch drive to close out the regular season after the Demon Deacons took an untimely sack, forcing them to punt and giving the visitors one final chance from its own 24 after a 10-yard holding penalty was enforced on the return.
The Wake Forest secondary was playing deep, so it was dinks and dunks from Murphy to creep his offense down the field. Duke took its penultimate timeout with 23 seconds left at its own 47-yard line, needing a major gain to get into range for Todd Pelino. Offensive coordinator Jonathan Brewer then drew up a halfback draw that caught the defense off guard. That set up what would be the winner, as Murphy found Moore streaking down the sideline to end the ballgame.
“I thought coach Brewer did a great job of mixing up some runs that got out there and got us across the 50. And then, like I said, the play that Maalik and Jordan made together was magical,” Diaz said.
It came down to minute details on the final drive for Wake Forest’s offense. Hank Bachmeier threw what appeared to be a backwards pass, with the ball squirting out back towards Duke’s end zone. Wesley Williams picked the ball up, but it was ruled his left foot was out of bounds on the recovery. As a result, the Demon Deacons retained the ball from where the redshirt sophomore touched it, setting up second-and-28 heading into the two-minute timeout.
“We want these games on us. Our defense wants to win the game. We want to force big plays like that backwards pass,” linebacker Ozzie Nicholas said. “We want to get touchdowns. We're an elite level defense that wants a game in our hands.”
The Blue Devil defense tried its best to pick up the offense’s slack as the third period drew to a close, blowing up the famous Wake Forest slow mesh and getting Duke the ball back near midfield. Murphy finally responded, connecting with Que’Sean Brown for a 30-yard gain, and Star Thomas found paydirt to make it 17-10 heading into the final 15 minutes.
Duke had fallen behind in four games by double digits coming into Saturday. In all four, it came back at a point and took the lead. That possibility seemed to become evident yet again right after the Thomas score, as Demond Claiborne fumbled a long kickoff return that gave Duke the ball right back in Wake Forest territory.
Jaquez Moore, playing in his fourth game of the season as he plans to redshirt due to injury, was a serious one-two punch with Thomas late in the contest. Moore put together three straight rushes for thirty yards to have the Blue Devils knocking on the door of the end zone, and Murphy pulled the next handoff and took it himself to tie the game at 17.
The Demon Deacons refused to disappear, as Bachmeier continued to make gutsy plays. After falling behind schedule due to a false start and facing third-and-long, the redshirt senior stood tall and fired one out to Taylor Morin for a first down, later finding Deuce Alexander who made a spectacular diving grab to move the chains again. The Blue Devils once again bent but did not break, as Wake Forest elected to punt from the Duke 41, skying the ball out of the back of the end zone to set Duke up.
The third time was the charm for the Wake Forest offense, as Bachmeier continued to be surgical. A few chunk plays moved the home team into Duke territory, and the former Louisiana Tech Bulldog then launched a deep ball to Horatio Fields who snagged it over Chandler Rivers, setting up first-and-goal. Tate Carney muscled his way into the end zone for the first touchdown of the day.
Duke looked to be primed for a big response after the score as Murphy zipped one across the middle to Jordan Moore for a 26-yard gain, but the Texas transfer overthrew Moore on the next attempt, leading to a costly interception.
Bachmeier was putting on his best Houdini impression during the first half, consistently evading sacks and scrambling for long gains that wore down Duke’s defense. After two of these big gains, Wake Forest elected to try a 36-yard field goal. This time, Matthew Dennis knocked it in for a 10-3 Demon Deacon lead, which they took into the halftime locker room.
“It was difficult, he's a big body, props to him. He's a good player, he's not easy to take down. There's definitely some that I wish I could have back, we just had to get him down,” Nicholas said.
Things only got worse for the Blue Devils as the third quarter marched on, as the second drive resulted in more inability to push the ball past the sticks. This time around, a checkdown to Moore ended disastrously, as the senior running back coughed up the football and set Wake Forest up inside the red zone.
Three plays later, Bachmeier found Fields for his first passing touchdown of the day, putting Duke at a 17-3 deficit that seemed like much more with its level of offensive play to that point.
With the winds whipping and frigid temperatures at play, the Demon Deacons were not afraid to push the ball downfield. Wake Forest marched out to midfield on its opening drive and picked up what seemed to be a big first down in Duke territory, only for the play to be negated due to a facemask penalty, forcing a punt after an incompletion on the ensuing play.
On the other hand, Duke’s offensive output to begin the game was nothing to write home about, as it was unable to generate any push up front in the run game. The Demon Deacon secondary clamped down to force two punts in the first eight plays for Murphy and company.
“Coach [Diaz] said we weren't having fun out there that first half. I knew I wasn't myself, and that’s why the first half looked the way it did. I wasn't playing well enough,” Murphy said.
The first drive out of the halftime locker room was just as anemic as the previous ones, as Duke lost one yard on the series after Murphy took a big sack on second down. Kade Reynoldson had to hurry off the following punt, giving Wake Forest a solid starting position to begin the third quarter.
Up next, the Blue Devils await the announcement of their bowl destination and opponent, which they will find out next Sunday.
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