DURHAM, N.C. – A blowout win over a program marketing itself as a team “on the rise,” Northwestern’s 44-7 victory against Duke on Saturday didn’t feel anything like a keeper for the record books.
The NU touchdowns came often and the Blue Devils crowd left early – many in search of better postgame parties at nearby Chapel Hill, N.C. But down on the field, the comfortable win wasn’t evoking stat-sheet comparisons with last season’s 54-51 instant classic against Michigan.
The numbers turned out to be deceptively gaudy, even more than the players realized.
The No. 16 Wildcats finished the game with 638 yards of total offense – just 16 hash marks (the length of Damien Anderson’s third touchdown run of the game) shy of the school record set last season against the Wolverines.
“That’s as easy as I can remember running the football,” said offensive guard Jeff Roehl, who helped the Cats to 303 yards on the ground.
Anderson finished with 189 yards and four touchdowns, tying his personal best. And quarterback Zak Kustok needed only four more yards in the air to tie his single-game high of 322 yards.
Informed of the evening’s near-misses in the record book, Roehl’s job-well-done postgame grin stretched even wider.
“Good day, huh?” he said.
Head coach Randy Walker was slightly more verbose.
“It’s good to see us come out and be less than perfect and have a little rust coming off of us,” Walker said. “You could just see as the game went on, we kept getting better and better. It started looking like Northwestern, like the way we’re supposed to play.”
The Cats (2-0) sputtered to a slow start, sweating off the effects of a two-week layoff since the season-opener at UNLV. For the second game this season, NU was unable to strike on its first possession, managing only a four-yard gain on three plays.
But following the two weeks of anticipation caused by the cancellation of last week’s football schedule, NU finally found its rhythm with five minutes remaining in the first quarter.
Kustok mixed handoffs to Anderson with passes to three different receivers, pushing the Cats 80 yards for their second touchdown of the game and a lead they would never relinquish.
“The first half of the game was a little slower,” Kustok said. “But in the second half it felt like pretty much everything we were doing was successful.”
NU opened the second half with a three-play, 70-second drive, run entirely by Anderson. Kevin Lawrence’s 45-yard kickoff return set up the offense at the Duke 49. Kustok then kept the ball in Anderson’s hands until the Heisman candidate took a 16-yard jog through a spotty Duke front seven into the end zone, making the score 27-7.
In the fourth quarter, Walker pulled his stars in favor of backup quarterback Tony Stauss, several second-stringers, and even a handful of players not listed on the team two-deep. The lineup shuffle brought in sophomore Jason Wright, who notched his first career touchdown on a 3-yard catch to close out the scoring.
The win was not only a D.A. Heisman show but also a display of Kustok’s ability to spread out the passing game. Kustok overthrew several long passes, but he connected with 10 different receivers, including a pair of true freshmen. He ended the game 21 of 31 for 318 yards.
On the other side of the ball, the NU defense held Duke tailback Chris Douglas to just 56 yards on the ground. Heading into Saturday, the sophomore was leading the Atlantic Coast Conference in all-purpose yards per game.
“A lot of the guys on the defense were upset to give up seven points, which is uncharacteristic,” Anderson said. “But that’s just great to hear them think like that.”
The game also showcased kicker David Wasielewski, a transfer from Florida. After hooking his first extra point attempt of the season at UNLV, the junior has hit all but one of his kicks in the last two games. On Saturday, he was perfect on five extra points and three field goals, nailing a 47-yarder at the end of the first half.
“It’s ironic, because he was a little suspect this week,” Walker said. Wasielewski missed several practices last week with a strained groin and wasn’t declared ready to play until just before kickoff Saturday.
“Maybe I just need to hurt him every week,” Walker joked.
Most of the 18,427 in attendance had left Wallace Wade Stadium – where banners celebrating athlete graduation rates outnumber ACC championship pennants – before witnessing a Duke record in its own right.
The loss marked the school’s 15th in a row, a string that dates back to 1999.
But for many Duke fans, showing up for the start of the game supported some kind of cause, if not the Blue Devils themselves. All proceeds from game tickets sold last week will go to relief efforts in New York and Washington.
Security was beefed up at the game as a result of the terrorist attacks, and fans observed a moment of pregame silence while a scoreboard montage played scenes from Sept. 11. The Blue Devils mascot paced the sidelines during the game waving an American flag.
After the win, Walker was as proud of his team for their performance on the field as for their behavior over the last two weeks.
“I like the way these kids manage themsleves emotionally,” he said. “They don’t get rattled, they just come back to play the next play. I think the maturity level of this team really gives us a chance to be pretty good.”
