Duke Defensive Hope
Short answer…Duke’s defense does not have much hope. This is a team that ranked 108th in the nation in total defense and 109th in scoring defense a year ago. There are a lot of players returning, with a couple notable exceptions. Abraham Kromah is gone after leading the team with 129 tackles, including 8.5 tackles-for-loss. And Patrick Egboh is also gone after leading the Blue Devils with 4.5 sacks during the 2010 season. If that sack total seems unimportant, keep in mind Duke only tallied 12 sacks all season long, so losing somebody with 4.5 sacks is a big deal.
That leaves a whole lot of players who are probably not too much better now than they were last year and a team that will not be much better as a result. Sometimes a unit can inject some talent into a struggling unit with a good recruiting class or even junior college transfers. That is not the case with Duke this year. In fact, the biggest hope they have as far as personnel is concerned is defensive tackle Sydney Sarmiento. He is coming off a strong freshman campaign and garnered some Freshman All-America honors. If he can take the next step, maybe Duke’s awful rush defense can improve a little bit.
Coach David Cutcliffe saw this coming with his defense this year. He opted to hand the reigns of the defense solely to Jim Knowles. Coach Knowles is moving to a base 4-2-5 defense, although the Blue Devils dabbled in all sorts of schemes last year to no avail. The move to a 4-2-5 seems to fit their current players, but it may not do much to help the rush defense. And if the rush defense cannot stop anybody, it really does not make too much of a difference how good the secondary does. The opposition can simply run over the Blue Devils again and their only hope is that quarterback Sean Renfree can outscore the opposition.
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