Cutcliffe means what he says

First-year coach's blunt approach has worked with the improved Blue Devils

DURHAM -- David Cutcliffe is very blunt. That was the quality Duke needed in its new football coach.

Duke needed Cutcliffe's words to cut through 14 losing seasons of apathy, frustration and worse.

Some things he said hurt at the beginning, but players came to expect them, then like them, then need them.

They now trust Cutcliffe. They do what he asks, enough that they have begun to win. With today's finale against rival North Carolina remaining, the Blue Devils are 4-7, the same number of wins in four previous seasons combined.

"The record speaks for itself," senior receiver Raphael Chestnut said. "You go from 0-12, 1-11 to 4-5 with 3 games left? Obviously it works. It's working for us."

"Say what you mean, mean what you say."

Ask anyone who knows Cutcliffe what phrase best describes him. His wife Karen, his children, his coaches, his players, his friends and his athletic director Kevin White all reply with that same quote.

Cutcliffe's mother, Francis Cutcliffe, instilled the need to speak bluntly into her children when they were growing up in Birmingham, Ala.

There was no time for sugarcoating during Cutcliffe's youth. At 11, his 7-year-old brother died. He lost his father Raymond when he was 15.

His mother had her own blunt words for the family.

She told them: "This will not be easy. We don't have any more money this month. This is all we have to eat."

When Cutcliffe was voted Class Favorite as a 16-year-old high school student, he wanted a new shirt for a yearbook picture. Francis Cutcliffe told her son to go borrow one from a friend. He did.

"It was a big deal to me, and I had to get that picture made in a borrowed shirt," he said. "I wanted a new one. She just told me no. We can't afford one. That's not a lot of fun for a 16-year old."

When the Blue Devils first started working with Cutcliffe, they had to change bad habits, beginning on the first day of winter conditioning.

Heading to the practice field that day, every Blue Devil took his usual shortcut, through an open fence and through some mulch -- that they then tracked onto the track and playing field at Wallace Wade Stadium.

Cutcliffe saw them and yelled, "You can't do that! Walk your butt around the track to the field!"

His point?

"There are no shortcuts," Cutcliffe said. "We don't cut corners. Our game field must be respected. At that time, they didn't think anything of it but from then on they walked the right way. ...It's inappropriate to not be disciplined all the time."

During that first workout, Cutcliffe was appalled that the team couldn't complete it. He stopped the scheduled 90-minute workout after 45 minutes and told them how out of shape they were and that everyone was going on a diet.

The players were embarrassed by the tirade but Cutcliffe made sure he did not squelch their hope.

"After he said that, he said we were capable of winning," Chestnut said. "He told us, 'He didn't know that we had that much talent on this team."

Duke senior linebacker Michael Tauiliili, a starter and defensive leader since the moment he stepped onto the field in royal blue, found himself caught by Cutcliffe's incisive words two months later, before spring break.

Everyone was trying to lose weight. Eventually the team would lose 500 pounds. At that time, however, Tauiliili was still at 242 and hadn't lost enough for Cutcliffe.

Tauiliili was planning to go to Miami with buddies for the week until Cutcliffe brought him in and told him it was OK to have fun but he better figure out his priorities or he'd be out of a job.

Tauiliili went home to Houston and worked out every day at his old high school, coming back five pounds slimmer at 237. He has played this season between 225 and 230.