Clemson Stunned by Duke

Duke Coach Steve Spurrier last week said his Blue Devils had a one-in-a-million chance of beating No. 7 Clemson.

“We were probably the only ones that believed we could win,” Spurrier said after Duke, a 15-point underdog, defeated Clemson, 21-17, Saturday in an Atlantic Coast Conference game.

“I said before the game that we needed to get a lot of breaks, but we didn’t get a whole bunch of breaks,” Spurrier said.

Junior quarterback Billy Ray, a transfer from Alabama, completed 24 of 43 passes for 262 yards and threw for two second-half touchdowns as the Blue Devils came back from a 14-0 halftime deficit.

Ray threw five interceptions, three in the first half, but his seven-yard scoring pass to Chris Brown with 3:18 left was the difference.

The last time Duke defeated Clemson was in 1980, when the Tigers were 2-9. They lost to the Blue Devils, 34-17, that year.

Duke, 2-3 overall, is 1-1 in the ACC. Clemson is 4-1 and 1-1.

The victory was Duke’s first over a top-10 team since 1971, when the Blue Devils defeated ninth-ranked Stanford, 9-3.

On the play before Duke’s final touchdown, Spurrier noticed that Brown was open.

Said Ray: “I just took a seven-step drop and looked left like I was going to throw it in the 30th row somewhere. Next thing you know, those linebackers had taken a fat drop.

“I turned around, threw it and I just prayed to God he’d get in the end zone--fall in if he had to--and let us get up by four. By God, he did it.”

Duke went 72 yards in 11 plays for the winning score.

Clemson got as far as the Duke 38-yard line on its final possession, but it was unable to convert a fourth-and-12, and the Blue Devils got the ball back with less than a minute left.

Early in the third quarter, Ray had a long pass intercepted by Clemson cornerback Dexter Davis, but Davis fumbled and Duke split end Darryl Clements recovered on the Clemson 23. Fullback Randy Cuthbert scored four plays later on a five-yard run with 7:53 left in the quarter.

Duke tied the score, 14-14, with 2:09 to play in the third quarter on Ray’s 18-yard pass to Clarkston Hines, who broke the ACC receiving record of 2,431 yards held by Wayne Baumgardner of Wake Forest. Hines, who had 96 yards Saturday, has 2,453 yards.