Category: 2024 Season

Interview – A Duke-MTSU College Huddle Collaboration Preview Episode

Duke takes to the road Saturday to face a Middle Tennessee Blue Raider team that is in the midst of an historic rebuild. The team had to fill around 60 roster spots this offseason in addition to getting a new coaching staff. What can we expect from the Blue Devils’ opponent on Saturday? Well, Jake from Blue Raider Pod stopped by to educate us on our opponent in Murfreesboro and get you ready for the game.

In addition to learning about Derek Mason and what he’s doing in his first season at MTSU, we learn a little bit about Blue Raider Nation. After you listen to this episode, stop by Jake’s pod and listen to me give my thoughts on Duke. This was another excellent College Huddle collaboration. I’m glad to be a small part of this new group.

There’s a few voicemails to start the episode which raise an important question – who is the biggest Blue Devil fan? Is it Cash Rogers or my dad? Let me know in the comments or by leaving a voice mail. Speaking of which …

Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!

Interview – A Duke-UCONN Crossover Preview Episode

Last year, we had Graham Chamberlain come on to update us on UCONN and preview the game. This year, we decided to do a joint episode for both our podcasts, so the setup is a little different from what you’re used to. That said, it’s a pretty darned good episode with a lot of information.

Graham brings us up to speed on a UCONN team dealing with some injuries and a lot of unknowns after playing an FCS team and then Maryland. I do my best to give fair and honest takes about the struggles we’ve seen offensively from Duke and how the recent injuries may affect the team on Saturday. While the defense is solid, the kicking teams have had some issues and the offense hasn’t run the ball consistently yet. Oh, and I also learn that the kickoff time wasn’t at 1pm like I thought. Glad I learned that before the game. Overall, I like what we’ve seen from the Blue Devils, but I remained concerned about the struggles in the running game. It’s just too hard to win by just passing.

As far as a score prediction, while we both think Duke will win, I am not predicting a blowout. Until the Blue Devils kick the offense up a notch and get more balanced, I’m expecting close, or relatively close, games. We also have to see what the team can do when it’s shorthanded at RB and at TE.

Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!

Interview – Get to Know the Northwestern Wildcats with Louie Vaccher

Our old friend Louie Vaccher returned to the podcast to bring us up to speed on the Wildcats. Both Duke and Northwestern are coming off slow starts in Week One. What will this mean for the Blue Devils on the road? Can they steal one on the road in Chicago? We’ll have to wait and see. If Duke can get a win, this will be a big, big victory for Manny Diaz. Getting to 2-0 after the all the turnover and transfers would be a statement that Coach Diaz has the Blue Devils moving in the right direction.

We also spend a few minutes talking about Chris Collins and the great things he’s been doing with the Wildcats.

Before the interview starts, we listen to a few voicemails and a text message. Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!

Interview – Season Prediction with Lee Rodio

Duke legend Lee Rodio returns to the podcast and provides us with his win-loss prediction for the Blue Devils this season. We go through each game and tell you who we think will win and why. We also check in with Richlandia to get an update on the status of the OG Optimistic Duke Football fan. You’ll like all our predictions as we’re very optimistic about what the Blue Devils can do this season.

One thing you’ll notice as we go through Duke’s schedule is how much time we spend discussing the differing degree of schedule difficulty the Blue Devils’ opponents have. This is one of the unfortunate side effects of conference restructuring – unbalanced schedules providing easier paths to a conference championship game. Sorry for an old man rant here, but there really is an upside to small conferences.

Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!

Interview – Steve Wiseman Previews Duke’s 2024 Season

Our old friend Steve Wiseman stopped by the podcast to cover a few different topics. We start off by dissecting what all happened to Flip’s draft stock and discuss the strange family dynamic that may have played a role in him falling as far as he did. After a brief detour from there to The ACC’s fight for survival, we do a deep dive on what to expect from Duke this season. While the Blue Devils have some unknowns, there is a lot to be excited about. Steve brings us up to speed on the QB situation, talks about our four-game murder’s row stretch and tells us why we should be cautiously optimistic about this season. The offense is going to be a Power Spread and will apparently involve the TEs. How can you not be excited about that?!?!

Trigger warning – we discuss Duke’s recent history of underutilizing its TEs. Noah Gray is mentioned. Consider yourself forewarned. And it turns out that David Feeley is pretty darned important. Who knew? (That’s sarcasm, we all know it.)

We also take a few minutes to cover the upgrades at Wallace Wade and ask I why the official Blue Devils’ Twitter account isn’t following me on Twitter. Come on, folks, make it happen.

Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Post, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!

Interview – College Huddle Collab about … That Team

As you know, Bull City Coordinators is part of the College Huddle Network. As part of that, and as an attempt to try and bring our country together in these trying times, I reached out to my colleagues The Heel Brothers and asked them to come on and talk about the upcoming season for the Heels. You can follow them (if you want to) here.

Sorry for the audio not being normalized. I’m not sure what happened, but we had issues from the very start.

Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Post, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!

Interview – Conor O’Neill Talks Duke and Wake

NOTE – The day after we recorded this, Mike Wright committed to Northwestern. Two days afterwards, Sion James committed to Duke. Just ignore those parts of the podcast. Be super attentive to everything else, though.

Our old friend Conor O’Neill stopped by to give us his thoughts on Wake Forest and Duke as the programs head into 2024. Conor covers both programs for Rivals. He’s got a good thing going over at Devils Illustrated – sign up, folks!

Before talking football, we took a few minutes to discuss the legacy of one of the greatest recording engineers (also known as a record producer) in music history, Steve Albini, who, sadly, passed away recently. He was a member of influential industrial rock bands like Big Black and Shellac. Albini’s career as prominent independent musician gave him an opportunity to start recording for other bands and he made the most of it. During his legendary career, Albini worked with a wide variety of bands including the Pixies, Nirvana, The Breeders, The Jesus Lizard, PJ Harvey and Man or Astro-man?. The story behind the initial recording of Nirvana’s In Utero is worth the time to read about. I enjoyed Albini’s sound as a young kid living in a fairly boring town. RIP, man. RIP.

After discussing what the Deacs can expect, we spend some time talking the Duke QB battle and how we shouldn’t overlook what Grayson Loftis might be able to do if he gets a shot. While we’re both high on Maalik Murphy, it’s hard not to think that Loftis might be able to make a name for himself in Durham. Oh, and Murphy has a canon for an arm and will showcase it as the Blue Devils will run a variation of the Air Raid. All right, all right, all right!

Conor and I also discuss the portal, NIL and how the NCAA needs to let schools employ athletes. And we get into a little basketball, too!

This is another good talk with a guy who is close to the program. I know you’ll enjoy it.

Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Post, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!

Interview – Matthew Reviews and Previews ACC Football

Our old friend Matthew from All Sports Discussion stopped by to recap the 2023 ACC football season and give his thoughts on the upcoming season. During our 50 plus minute talk, we cover the disappointments of 2023 (beyond The Snub, we mention UNC and Miami), the bright side of last season (looking at you, Virginia Tech) and what to expect from our beloved conference this year. While the Hoos could be looking at hiring a new coach if things don’t go well in Charlottesville, the Hokies look primed to be this year’s Louisville as a result of winning the schedule lottery. All things considered, this could be a fun year for The ACC (while it still exists).

Oh, and we talk Conference Restructuring for a little bit because of course we did. Also, my audio was a little off. I got a new set of headphones and apparently didn’t select the input properly. It happens.

Please call the pod (540-632-0160), leave a message and you’ll get in an episode.

Let me know what you think about what we think in the comments, on Mastodon, on Reddit, on Post, on Instagram, Spoutible, Bluesky or on Twitter.

As always, Go Duke!