After a 90-minute lightning delay, Duke finally got its 2026 season rolling Saturday night - and the Blue Devils did it with a 17-3 win over Tulane that looked even more lopsided than the score says.
The game began with a statement, just as Manny Diaz said it would. Duke won the toss and took the ball first, and the opening series turned into one of the strangest drives the program has seen in a while.
Walker Eget’s first series started with a nine-yard loss on an uncaught backwards pass that may not have been backwards at all. From there, Duke kept digging itself into holes - second-and-19, second-and-15, second-and-9 - and kept climbing out of them.
The Blue Devils converted five third downs on the drive, capped by Nate Sheppard’s nine-yard touchdown run to finish a 9:53 march and make it 7-0.
That set the tone for Sheppard’s night. He ripped off 60 rushing yards on that opening drive alone before Tulane had even touched the ball, then kept rolling from there. By halftime, he had 139 rushing yards, including a tackle-shedding 13-yard run that helped set up a Cosme Salas field goal and stretched the lead to 10-0.
Duke leaned heavily on two and even three tight ends, and Sheppard said he hopes that package keeps showing up as the season goes on. It fit the night perfectly, because Duke’s ground game was the cleanest answer to everything Tulane tried to do.
The defense was just as imposing. Duke controlled the line of scrimmage and smothered Tulane on money downs, holding the Green Wave to 3-for-14 on third down and denying both of their fourth-down tries.
Depth was a major offseason talking point, and it showed up everywhere: 23 different Devils recorded a tackle, with no one topping six. Nick Morris, Jr., Bryce Davis and Luke Mergott each had six, while Davis added two sacks and Bradley Gompers chipped in the other one.
Both Davis and Gompers are sophomores.
Morris sounded almost as fired up as the numbers looked.
“It felt there was a different mentality to this defense, a different edge. I think that came to fruition tonight.
I thought that was one of the best defensive performances I’ve seen in my six years here. It felt so awesome to play together.
I think we played very selfless football on defense. Guys were happy for each other having success.”
Duke also won the field-position battle, and Kate Reynoldson was a big part of that. The Aussie uncorked a 62-yard punt that landed at the Tulane 17 and later pinned the visitors at their own 4. Diaz singled him out for helping tilt the field.
Still, for all of Duke’s control, the Blue Devils never fully buried Tulane. Salas’ 32-yard field goal in the first half was described as looking like “a duffer hitting a one-iron,” and Duke also came away empty after a fourth-down play deep in Tulane territory was first ruled a first down before review overturned it. Eget also struggled to connect on throws downfield, missing several open receivers and leaving touchdowns on the field.
That got noticeable enough that fans cheered when backup Dan Mahan entered just to run the ball, then booed when Eget returned. Diaz defended his quarterback’s night by pointing to the game management and the fact that Eget did not turn it over, while saying Duke will keep improving through the air.
The teams traded fumbles coming out of the locker room. Luke Mergott forced a Tulane fumble at the end of a 39-yard pass play, while Sheppard coughed it up at the Tulane 45 after a 13-yard run - the only blemish on a huge individual performance. Duke also lost the ball on downs three times, including another drive that ended after a third-down completion was overturned and the fourth-down pass fell incomplete.
Tulane switched quarterbacks at halftime and finally got on the board with a field goal to make it 10-3, but that was as close as it got. Sheppard closed the door with a 14-yard touchdown run with 6:44 left.
He finished with a career-high 227 rushing yards on 35 carries and added 19 more yards on three catches.
“Credit to that O-line and the tight ends. They were working their butts off today and they made it happen. They were opening up the holes and it’s up to me to get to the second and third levels and make some dudes miss.”
Diaz called it an identity game, the kind of performance he wanted after hearing all summer that Duke was due to fall back to earth. For a defense-first coach, a 17-3 win like this probably looked a whole lot better than a shootout ever would.
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