Duke got close to beating Virginia Tech and now the Devils have a chance to beat Miami, a team not as powerful as Virginia Tech. But after losing so many close games, how are the Devils handling it.

“We’re handling it fine,” Duke coach David Cutcliffe said. “You could use the word ‘frustration’ and you could use the word ‘anger’. I thought we had a lot of that in the locker room and around here on Sunday. Those are okay. Those can be turned into positive emotion. Discouraged we’re not. We’re not going to be. We have nothing to be discouraged about. We’re playing well.”

Cutcliffe said in order for Duke to get over the hump, the players need to look inward to each get better. “The quality of the team is the collection of the quality and the habits of the people that are the part of the team,” he said. “That is our challenge, to try to take that to another level.”

Cutcliffe indicates that religion plays a part in his dealing with losses on Saturdays. “Before I go to church, I get a little look at the opponent. Then I find sometimes some way, somehow, I’m going to find some peace in that morning. By Sunday afternoon, I’m generally ready to go once I see the squad. I have my mind set on what we have to do. Somewhere along the way I have good people and the good Lord lifting me up, I think.”