Week 1 is here, and Duke is already offering a few clues about how this season could take shape.
The Blue Devils open 2026 at home against Tulane in 48 hours, with a scorching day expected in Durham. Manny Diaz’s team enters as the defending ACC champion, but the national buzz around Duke has cooled after the loss of star quarterback Darian Mensah to Miami in the Transfer Portal. San Jose State transfer Walker Eget is set to take over under center, bringing experience and steadiness as Duke shifts toward a more power-based run game built around sophomore back Nate Sheppard and what should be one of the league’s best offensive lines.
Duke’s first depth chart of the season dropped this week, and it came with its share of surprises. Some players clearly helped themselves in camp. Others, despite plenty of summer chatter, found themselves further down the board than expected.
At receiver, Jayden Moore and Kavon Simmons are the names to watch. Moore, now a third-year player, is listed as a co-starter at one of Duke’s three wideout spots after seeing limited work last season.
He caught seven passes for 42 yards and also handled some return duties. Simmons, meanwhile, redshirted as a freshman but now appears poised for a much larger role.
The second-year receiver didn’t generate a ton of public buzz during camp, but his rise to co-starter shows how much ground he’s made.
That makes the placement of Jaivon Solomon even more interesting. He’s listed third at the same position, which is a notable slide given the attention he drew in camp.
Solomon flashed in Duke’s first scrimmage with 50 receiving yards and two touchdowns, and many thought he had a strong path to the WR3 job. For now, though, the veteran transfers Jared Richardson, Javen Nicholas, and Jonah Burton still seem to be part of a wide-open competition among Duke’s younger pass catchers.
In the secondary, Kyon Loud made one of the biggest climbs. The Montana transfer came in with some FCS experience, having played in 20 games and started seven, but he was mostly viewed as a depth option entering the fall. Instead, Duke put him in the starting lineup for Week 1, and he beat out a returning starter to get there.
That returning starter is Kimari Robinson, who now sits behind Loud on the depth chart. Diaz made clear all offseason that every spot in the secondary was open, even with three starters back from a year ago.
That stance makes sense after Duke’s pass defense struggled badly last season, a major reason the defense slipped in 2025 after being a Top 25 group in 2024. Robinson started last season, but the message from this depth chart is plain: Duke wants more on the back end.
Another player who moved up is Andrew Pellicciotta. The sophomore safety earned the starting free safety job after beating out a group of veterans, including Stanford transfer Che Ojarikre, who had been seen as the favorite.
Pellicciotta got real snaps as a freshman and impressed enough in camp to lock down the spot. He’ll now line up alongside returning starter DaShawn Stone, giving Duke a safety pairing the staff clearly believes in.
One of the biggest surprises from the depth chart release was also one of the toughest to ignore: Owen Wafle did not even fully secure a backup spot on the defensive line. The Penn State/Michigan transfer arrived with plenty of pedigree and was widely projected to start up front, so his placement stands out as a major disappointment.
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Duke Is Bringing A New Reality To Cameron Indoor
Dukes home floor is about to look a little different, as the university announced a new partnership with wealth management firm Edward Jones that will bring the companys logo onto the court at Cameron Indoor Stadium beginning in the 2026-27 season. The deal adds another layer to the changing business of college athletics, where brand placements have become part of the scenery even in a building as iconic as Cameron.
There is more to the arrangement than what will be seen on the floor. Duke said the partnership will also include financial education and counseling for student-athletes, a nod to the off-court side of college sports that schools now have to treat as seriously as recruiting and competition. Duke vice president and director of athletics Nina King pointed to the shared values between the university and Edward Jones, suggesting the relationship is as much about fit as it is about visibility. [Read more 🡒]
Kon Knueppel Just Sparked A Duke Legends Debate Fans Will Love
Kon Knueppel has barely finished his first season in the NBA, but he is already feeding one of Duke basketballs favorite offseason debates. The former Blue Devil, now with the Charlotte Hornets after going No. 4 overall in the 2025 NBA Draft, was asked by Marty Mush of Barstool Sports to put together his all-time Duke starting five, and the answer was the kind of list that gets people arguing immediately.
It was the sort of lineup built for instant pushback and nostalgia, with plenty of familiar names from different eras and a Hall-of-Fame level reserve waiting in the wings. For Duke fans, the fun now is in the reaction, because lists like this always reveal as much about the selector as they do about the programs history, and Knueppel left plenty of room for the next debate to begin. [Read more 🡒]
Duke Opener Will Reveal How Ready This New-Look Roster Really Is
The season opener will give this new-look roster its first real chance to show what it is, and Dukes coach made clear that the early weeks matter even more when a team is sorting through new personnel and trying to establish an identity. Fall camp brought plenty of competition, and the staff believes the defensive group has carried a renewed sense of urgency compared with a year ago, which should at least give the Blue Devils a firmer baseline as the games begin to count.
At the same time, the first game will also reveal how much stability Duke has found on offense after naming Walker Eget its starting quarterback. The line has already taken a hit with Roman Fina set to miss the season because of a lower-body injury suffered in camp, so the opener will be about more than just execution. It will show how quickly the Blue Devils can absorb a few early roster changes and still settle into something recognizable. [Read more 🡒]