Do. Not.
Poke. The.
Bear.
Stanford defensive back Brandon Nicholson gave Duke exactly the kind of fuel teams try to avoid handing over. This week, Nicholson said, “Nobody’s going to run against our defense?”-while also acknowledging that Duke’s Nate Sheppard was “one of the top rushers in the country.”
Duke heard it. And then Duke ran anyway.
The Blue Devils rolled to a 35-7 win over Stanford on Saturday, improving to 3-0 behind a ground game that churned out 268 rushing yards at 5.7 yards per carry. Sheppard was right at the center of it, finishing with 154 yards and two touchdowns before checking out late once the game was comfortably in hand.
“It was a type of arrogance.”
Sheppard didn’t go looking for the comment, but he made it clear he noticed it.
Duke’s start was a jolt, with an onside kick recovery to open the game and 46 yards on its first three snaps, enough to reach first-and-goal at the 7. The drive fizzled there, though, and Walker Eget’s fourth-down pass was picked off in the end zone.
Even with no points to show for it, Manny Diaz said the sequence mattered.
The first quarter ended scoreless, but Duke broke through with a nine-play, 90-yard touchdown march. That drive featured a 22-yard Eget completion to Jared Richardson for his first catch in a Duke uniform, a 14-yard C.J.
Campbell run, and a 19-yard pass to Jaivon Solomon. After a penalty pushed Duke back to the Stanford 32, Sheppard finished it off and put the Blue Devils ahead 7-0.
Duke made it 14-0 on its next scoring trip, a shorter 35-yard march set up by Kevin O’Connor forcing a fumble and Kendall Johnson recovering it. O’Connor and Tyson Reed both crashed into the quarterback on the play.
“That sucked, for about two minutes,” O’Connor said. “But it was worth it.”
Hasley came through with an 18-yard grab to help set up Sheppard’s second touchdown, a short pitch-and-catch. Duke looked ready to carry a 14-0 lead into halftime, but Stanford’s Aidan Flintoft pinned the Blue Devils at their 4 and Duke couldn’t move the chains. Stanford responded with its lone scoring drive, leaning mostly on the pass, and the halftime margin was 14-7.
“The locker room at halftime was outstanding,” Diaz said. “The guys were ready to go.”
O’Connor added “everyone was like, ‘whatever. Move on.
Next play.’ “
Whatever happened at halftime, Duke came out of it with the game in a chokehold. The Blue Devils ripped off a 75-yard touchdown drive and then a 73-yard touchdown drive in the third quarter, both ending in the end zone. Sheppard scored the first from a yard out, and then Kavon Simmons turned one of the night’s more entertaining moments into six points when he took the ball with every intention of throwing it, saw the Stanford defense collapse, and ran it in himself.
That made it 28-7 after three quarters, and Stanford never got back into it.
Duke’s defense kept stacking stops while the pressure kept coming. Stanford’s offense went punt, punt, punt, then back-to-back three-and-outs.
Davis Warren was sacked four times and under duress far more often than that. Diaz said Duke “strangled the life out of Stanford’s offense.”
He credited the back end for helping make it happen.
“The quarterback is so good with just getting the ball out on his first read. The credit goes first to the coverage.
I thought we covered very well to make him hold the ball. And then we were relentless up front.
We had a lot of guys out there creating discomfort for the quarterback.”
O’Connor said Duke believed it could win the edge battle.
“We really wanted to work the edges against these guys, especially coming off last week, where we didn’t feel like we played to the standard as a D-line. Just relentless pressure. Never give them a break.”
With the game well in hand, Duke turned to reserves, including quarterback Dan Mahan and backup running backs Campbell and true freshman Jayvian Tanelius. Tanelius finished the scoring with a five-yard touchdown run.
By the end, Duke had piled up 470 total yards to Stanford’s 237, and the Cardinal managed just 2 of 11 on third down and 0 for 2 on fourth. Eget was 14 of 24 for 202 yards, Hasley caught five passes for 88 yards, and Sheppard’s night stood out as the centerpiece of the Blue Devils’ attack.
It still wasn’t spotless. Diaz said Duke’s tackling wasn’t where it needed to be in the first half, though that got corrected. He also pointed to the penalties, with Duke flagged nine times for 80 yards for a second straight week.
Hasley chalked that up to early-season issues, while Diaz called it Duke’s “Achilles heel.”
One number that keeps standing out: Duke still hasn’t allowed a second-half touchdown this season. Tulane and Illinois each managed only a field goal after halftime, and Stanford never got that far.
Diaz said the challenge this week was handling favorite status the right way.
“We really challenged our guys this week to really present the best version of oursleves, to just be us. We had a phenomenal week of preparation.
I sensed no tightness. No one was afraid to make a mistake.”
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Nate Sheppard has been the spark for Duke, giving the offense a steady ground presence and helping keep Stanford on its heels. Still, the game was not entirely settled before the break, because the Cardinal trimmed the margin late in the half when Davis Warren found Caden High for a touchdown, a reminder that one clean drive can quickly change the feel of a game that had looked firmly in Dukes hands. [Read more 🡒]
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Nate Sheppard was the clear engine of the night, handling 23 carries for 156 yards and three touchdowns as Duke controlled the game at home. On defense, Bryce Davis made his presence felt on the line, while Evan Smiths night showed the sort of learning moments that come with early-season work, including a defensive holding penalty and a touchdown allowed. For a team still defining roles, the Stanford game offered a useful snapshot of who is stepping into them fastest. [Read more 🡒]