Stanford came east to whip Duke 44-14 last season. Duke coach David Cutcliffe, who recruits heavily in California, says he likes going to play on the West Coast but again this season it will be a challenge to play familiar-foe Stanford.
“They were extremely impressive (last year) and are now (this year) on tape,” Cutcliffe said during his weekly media teleconference. “Very, very talented, well-coached football team that just does so many things right. They’re good in the kicking game. They’re good on offense. Extremely physical offense with a lot of big-play capability there, and a defense that’s just relentless.”
He said he thinks his Blue Devils are well prepared.
Q. Coach, can you talk a little bit about
what you’ve done to keep your team focused
after beating FIU?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: I think all you have
to do is turn on the tape of last year’s Stanford
game. I don’t think it was hard to regather. We
have a lot of people that played a lot of football
here, so they understand that Sunday you watch
the previous game, you put it behind you, you’re
moving forward from that point on.
I think we’ve done a solid job of doing that.
The first week you have to practice like that,
obviously after camp, then an opener. I think
we’ve done a solid job of doing that.
Q. Did you use any of that game to test
off potential plays you might use against
Stanford?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: We run our offense,
we run our defense, you game plan. But you have
a defensive and offensive playbook. All of it comes
from within that. So we’ll try to do what we do
best.
Q. Coach, I wanted to ask you about
the travel. Coach (Tom) O’Brien was talking
about the difficulty when you have to cross
three time zones. Is that a problem and what
do you do to alleviate it?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: I’ve done it a lot. I
think it can be a problem if you let it be one. I think
the worst thing – me personally – is to go out and
try to stay two days, get on their time zone, et
cetera, et cetera. Your body really doesn’t have
that amount of time to change.
We’re going to make sure we hydrate.
We’re going to get on the plane Friday, fly out
midday, get there in the afternoon their time.
Going to stretch as soon as we get there. We’ll
have worked out that morning, but we’ll get the
kinks out. Take a while, get to the motel, eat, do
our normal routine, meet, get their snacks, put
them to bed.
The only difference we’re going to do is let
them sleep in on Saturday morning, and by
‘sleeping in’ means sleeping in on eastern time.
18- to 23-year-olds have no trouble, no trouble
sleeping in on a Saturday morning. Once we get
up out there, we will be just in a normal 7:00, 7:30
kickoff mode, and nothing will be different than if
we were here.
Q. Unlike a lot of schools around here,
you have recruited California fairly heavily.
Can you talk about that. Is playing a game out
there, showing the flag, important at all?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: Yeah, sure. We’re
going to see Cooper Helfet, one of our more recent
California products, that just finished by going to
San Francisco. That’s where he is from. All of our
L.A. parents are driving up. We have Corbin
McCarthy, Deion Williams, and Blair Hilliday from
Los Angeles, Brandon Connette. We’re
represented well out there and we’re going to
continue to recruit well out there.
I like playing in California. I like the
opportunity for people to see what Duke football is
all about.
Q. Stanford score-wise appeared to
struggle in their first game. Won by three
points. Obviously there’s a transition from the
Andrew Luck era into the next one. Can you
tell a whole lot of difference? Are they making
many adjustments on offense or are they just
running pretty much the same system with a
different guy?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: They were a little
simpler just because you’re going to be. You went
from the first player taken in the draft to a young
man that had really relatively no experience.
That’s not easy for anyone. He’s got a game under
his belt. He’ll be much better this week. Not that
he was bad.
Also, I knew this, because Mike McIntyre
(head coach at San Jose State and former Duke
defensive coordinator) and I talked all summer,
they played a good San Jose team. San Jose is
going to have a really good season this year, in my
opinion. In watching the tape, you saw two good
football teams. Mike’s defense is experienced and
physical. Matched up to them pretty well. Kept
them from making big plays. If an offense doesn’t
get a lot of explosives, it’s hard to get a lot of
yards. I thoughts that’s what San Jose did best.
On the other side, their defense at
Stanford didn’t disappoint at all. They held San
Jose to 17 points and not very many yards. They
were very impressive on defense and very
impressive in the kicking game.
They’ve had a change there. Their special
teams coach left and they have a new special
teams coach. I thought they played extremely well
in that area.
Don’t get confused by scores. This is a
really good Stanford football team. This is a
No. 18 team minimally in the country, so we have
our hands full.
Q. Did your team exceed your
expectations in that opener?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: No. I thought all
along we had a good football team. A lot of guys
that have played a lot of football here. We have
more depth, some talented young people.
The problem we knew going in, we had a
lot of people out of the game. We had 12
scholarship-position players out of the game. It
frightens you. We had 21 people play their first
college football, 10 true freshmen and 11 redshirt
freshmen.
I think the thing I was pleased about, I
don’t know that I was surprised, was that those
guys played well. We’ll need them to continue to
do that. If we can do that and build our depth, we
have a chance to have a solid football team.
Q. I know you expected a lot from a
fifth-year senior guy. Can you evaluate Sean’s
(Renfree) first game. Did he live up to your
expectations?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: Yeah, obviously he
threw the interception, backed up where he babied
a ball, missed a couple throws he really didn’t need
to.
It was interesting. I would want to see his
response. I went up and said, Hey, it’s been a
shaky start. Don’t let it set you back. Let’s get this
thing cranked up, which he did. I think he played
better than he’s played from that point on. His
statistics were incredible. Not only that, he was
accurate with the ball. He had two balls dropped
after that, and it could have been a better night for
him than 21 of 30. He could have been 23 of 30.
If he would have had a better start, he would have
had 350 yards passing. The one he missed to
Jamison deep in the end zone, he could have had
an incredible night. He just barely missed that
deep post. I think he is well on his way to having a
special year. I am excited to see him continue to
compete and keep playing at the level he’s playing.
Q. My impression was he probably
threw deep better than I’ve seen him throw
before. Do you agree with that?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: Yeah, without a
doubt. That’s not an accident. That’s something
they’ve worked on all summer. We’ve asked him
to do. They’re further along than where we’ve
been.
I think this team made a huge commitment
in the summer on their own, which was really
pleasing to me, and is a tribute to Sean Renfree,
our upperclassmen that are hungry.
It’s never guaranteed. We play a tough
schedule. Everybody is good. Everybody can
beat us. We’re going to throw our hat in the ring
and see what happens. If you want to have a
special year, you have to make a commitment to it.