Duke: The Worst Game on the Schedule
It's not a particularly talented opponent, not a road trip, not anything that would usually make a game the "worst," but nonetheless this matchup against Duke is what I'm going to call the Worst Game of 2008.
If ever there was a trap game, this is it. Wake will be coming off of back to back road games against solid opponents. Three big, important games that will not be gimmies are coming up. There is no bye week in sight. So obviously. . . this is the perfect game to take a break, right?
I certainly hope not.
Duke is not going to be good. It's pretty impossible to remember them every being good, and it's hard to imagine the next time they will be. I realize people would have said the same thing about Wake not too long ago, but that doesn't mean Duke will be the same way.
Perhaps new coach David Cutcliffe will start to turn things around, but not right away. Maybe they have some more talent, or more interest from new athletic director Kevin White, but they'll still be the underdog in every single ACC game they play.
So it's clear Duke is awful, but this game is still the Worst.
If the Deacs didn't have a recent trend of playing down to opponents, maybe I wouldn't worry so much. If the Deacs hadn't tried as hard as they could to lose to Duke in my second ever game at Groves stadium, maybe I wouldn't worry so much. If Duke hadn't scored 13 points in the fourth quarter last season to come within five points of Wake, maybe I wouldn't worry so much.
But all those things have happened, and consequently I may very well be worried every time we play Duke for the rest of my life. We better not let this one slip away, it'd be an awful way to let a season with so much potential slip away.
7/14/08, 11:17 AM
Yeah...this one is a major trap game. Duke is going to want it badly. If we come out to win, that it will be a win, if not then we may survive or we may have an embarassing loss on our hands.
7/15/08, 1:01 AM
For whatever reason Duke always plays us close. Our defense shouldn't give up a point to Duke, even if they have Thaddeus Lewis and Eron Riley. Look for Wake to wake up this year when they play the Blue Devils.
7/15/08, 10:35 PM
i dont expect any respect, when it comes to duke football, yet, especially from another ACC school. but being arrogant is never a good thing, especially after how close we have played wake in the past few years...i thought that wake would be more understanding about a one year turnaround but i guess not.
7/23/08, 9:31 PM
Duke has as much talent or more than Wake as rated by Scout (for what that's worth). If Ted Roof had let Thad Lewis cut loose and keep throwing to Eron Riley, that outcome could easily have been different last year. With much better conditioning this year at Duke, they will be stronger at the close and we need to watch our hind ends.
There will be no easy games in the ACC