Carney, Hinton, defense end Deacs’ discontent against Duke

Duke has become accustomed to winning football games the past four years, and especially against Wake Forest.

That changed Saturday. The Demon Deacons used some bullish running and three touchdowns from Cade Carney, the swiftness and elusiveness of quarterback Kendall Hinton and some stout defense to top the Blue Devils 24-14 at Wallace Wade Stadium in their ACC opener.

It was the kind of game that left Wake Forest coach Dave Clawson feeling optimistic about the rest of the season and Duke coach David Cutcliffe saying some quick reevaluation needed to be done. It also had the Blue Devils (1-1) doing some early season soul-searching.

Duke defensive tackle A.J. Wolf, a team captain, said he told his teammates to remember the sting of losing.

“We’ve been pretty blessed at Duke the past four years to mostly celebrate after games,” Wolf said. “When this stuff happens it really hurts. It really hits home.”

Close football games often are decided on plays that come unexpectedly or plays when the ball takes a favorable bounce. So it was Saturday as the Deacons (2-0) ended a four-game losing streak to Duke.

Carney, who rushed for 108 yards and three scores, had one of those surprising, decisive plays. With the score tied 14-14 late in the third quarter and the Deacons facing third-and-1 at their 45, the Blue Devils stacked the line defensively and Carney, a 5-foot-11, 215-pound freshman from Advance, made the Devils pay with a 55-yard scoring run.

Carney’s sudden burst came one possession after Wake Forest punter Dom Maggio altered field position. Maggio, who averaged 46.4 yards on seven punts, got off a 56-yarder, the ball rolling and bounding to the Duke 22.

Duke got 332 yards passing from quarterback Daniel Jones, a redshirt freshman who was 31-of-48 in his second start. But the Devils had no success running the ball against a physical, active, Wake Forest defense, had three turnovers and had freshman AJ Reed miss a pair of field goals.

Jones scored both Duke touchdowns on short option runs, but he had a pair of fumbles, a late interception and was sacked five times.

“We just shot ourselves in the foot,” said Duke receiver Anthony Nash, who had eight catches for 112 yards. “We didn’t execute, and we had penalties. We didn’t play like ourselves.”

Nor did Wake Forest play like it did in a 7-3 win over Tulane in its opener. The Deacons had 79 rushing yards in that game but outrushed Duke 239 yards to 37 as Carney had 108 yards on 17 carries.

“We had to take away the run and try and make them one-dimensional,” Clawson said. “For a while we regretted doing that because they threw the ball so well. We wanted to take away the run, make them throw it and hopefully get them off schedule a little bit.’

The Deacons did that. Clawson also threw the Devils off by quickly ditching his two-quarterback system and turning the game over to Hinton, a sophomore who played at Southern Durham High.

“We felt we needed a spark,” Clawson said of the change.

Hinton gave the Deacons that, hurting Duke with the explosive plays Cutcliffe said was a nemesis of the Blue Devils last year. His 32-yard run in the second quarter led to Carney’s 7-yard scoring run and a 7-7 tie, and late in the game he connected with Alex Backman on a 62-yard pass that set up Mike Weaver’s 34-yard field goal for the 24-14 lead.

The Deacons, 0-for-6 on third-down conversions in the first half, converted six of 11 in the second half. Carney became the first Wake Forest freshman to have a three-TD game since Chris Barclay against Purdue in 2002.

Duke linebacker Joe Giles-Harris had 15 tackles and an interception in his second college game, but Cutcliffe said execution errors and missed tackles dogged the Blue Devils.

“We played hard. What we didn’t do is play well,” Cutcliffe said. “We won’t run from this. We’ll run right to it.”

This story was originally published September 10, 2016 at 9:50 PM with the headline "Carney, Hinton, defense end Deacs’ discontent against Duke."