Wade's success at Alabama of three national championships was translated well to Duke's program, most notably in 1938. The team went without being scored upon the entire regular season. The Duke team is one of three in college football history to have gone undefeated, unscored upon, and untied in the regular season. The football program also had a string of successful years in the late 1980s when the team was coached by Steve Spurrier. The team rose to prominence in 1994, the first season under Coach Fred Goldsmith. The team was briefly ranked as high as #13 in the country before losing the last two games of the season 24-23 to North Carolina State and 41-40 to arch-rival North Carolina. The 1994 team played in the program's first New Years Day Bowl game since 1962, falling to Wisconsin 34-21 in the Hall Of Fame Bowl, now know as the Outback Bowl.
The Blue Devils have won seven ACC Football Championships. Ten ACC Football Players of the Year have come from Duke, the most in the ACC. Three former team members were inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame, tying the Miami Hurricanes for the most inductees in the ACC.
Duke is consistently ranked at the top of the list of Division I-A schools which graduate nearly all of their football players. Duke has topped the list for12 years, earning it the most Academic Achievement Awards of any university. Notre Dame has been honored six times, while Boston College and Northwestern have won the award four times each.
University of North Carolina is the main rival of the Duke Blue Devils.
Wallace Wade and Steve Spurrier are the famous coaches for Duke Blue Devils
Wallace Wade previously coached for the University of Alabama began coaching for Duke in 1930. Wade's achievements placed him in the Hall of Fame.
Steve Spurrier lead the Blue Devils to three consecutive winning seasons from 1987-1989, culminating with the Blue Devils sharing the ACC title in 1989 and playing in the All-American Bowl, where the Blue Devils lost to Texas Tech. The 1989 ACC Title was the last title won by a school in the state of North Carolina until Wake Forest won their second ACC Title in 2006.
