College athletes today like to say they don’t pay much attention to so-called bulletin-board material, don’t let it get in their heads. Old school stuff, they say.
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But …
Duke running back Nate Sheppard said he got wind of a story coming out of New Orleans this past week, something about a Tulane linebacker saying how the Green Wave planned to beat Duke in the season opener Saturday.
“He made a comment that if they could keep No. 20 under 200, they could win the game,” Sheppard said.
That would mean keeping Sheppard, No. 20 in Duke blue, to less than 200 yards.
His reaction?
“I think our O-line, our offense, took that personal a little bit,” Sheppard said. “It was disrespectful to our wide receivers, our quarterback, our tight end Jerry Hasley, who I think is one of the best in the country. He didn’t mention any of them. And then, just to think they can stop me, and stuff like that. …
“We kind of took that and ran with it.”
Sheppard ran, 35 times. He had 227 yards rushing in a 17-3 victory.
Sheppard scored both Duke touchdowns in a win that didn’t have a lot of style points but was everything Duke coach Manny Diaz was after in a season opener. Sheppard ran. The offense moved the ball, kept the ball.The defense kept Tulane out of the end zone and mostly off the field. The special teams were solid enough.
Granted, there were penalties – eight in all for Duke. But the Green Wave had 15, including a couple that wiped out big offensive plays.
“It was a sloppy football game and they played way less sloppy than we did, so credit to them,” Tulane coach Will Hall said.
Tulane did all it could to try and slow down Sheppard, who is listed at 5-11 and 205 pounds but looks bigger. The Green Wave loaded up defenders near the line, only to have Sheppard often bounce off them or run around them. Some of his runs appeared to leave them befuddled, if not bewildered.
“For them to game plan to stop him and be unable to stop him is the sign of a great player,” Diaz said of the sophomore from Mandeville, Louisiana. “Everybody knows when you hand the ball to No. 20 he has chance to go all the way.”
A bigger test will be coming this week – Duke at Illinois in the Blue Devils’ first road game. The Fighting Illini opened their season with a 42-23 win over UAB in a Thursday night game in Champaign, Illinois.
Illinois was limited to 332 yards in total offense and picked up 54 on a last-second Hail Mary pass and score to end the first half. UAB had the ball for 41 minutes in the game.
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The Blue Devils and Illini went at it in Durham last season, ACC vs Big Ten. The Illini came away with a 45-19 win, taking a 14-13 halftime lead and then piling up 31 second-half points.
Duke had 438 yards in total offense but just 82 rushing as Jaquez Moore led the Blue Devils with 30 yards on six carries. Sheppard, playing his second college game, had 24 yards on five carries.
Duke added a new offensive twist Saturday against Tulane, something that the Illini defensive coaches will be studying. The Blue Devils used three tight ends at times, with Hasley, Nate Kurisky and Jake Taylor in the formation.
“That’s something we really have not done,” Diaz said.
The Blue Devils said they were not fazed by the 90-minute pregame delay that was caused by the threat of severe weather. They watched video, they said, and calmly waited for the call to begin pregame warmups on the field.
Duke already had decided to take the ball first if they won the opening coin toss, Diaz said. They did, then put together a 17-play drive that consumed nearly 10 minutes and ended on Sheppard’s first TD for a 7-0 lead.
Sheppard got the ball 11 times, ripping off a 12-yard gain on one third-and-12 play and rushing for 51 yards in the possession. That set the tone.
“The opening drive, we did not tackle well,” Tulane’s Hall said after the game. “And 20 is a really good football player. I tip my hat to him, man. He’s a great back.”
Sheppard said he believes Dickson Agu was the Tulane linebacker who was “disrespectful” with his pregame words. During a Tulane press conference last week, Agu did say Sheppard would be the Green Wave’s defensive focus.
“That’s what the game plan is built around,” Agu said. “Stop 20. If we can stop 20, we’ll win the game.”
Agu’s comments provided a “little extra fuel,” Sheppard said, also referring to it as “bulletin-board material.”
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If so, expect mostly radio silence out of Illinois this week.