DURHAM, N.C. — No. 11 Illinois had just closed out a strong second-half performance that turned a close tussle at halftime into a lopsided win at Duke. And coach Bret Bielema had plenty of key plays to rattle off as he basked in the glow of a road victory.
But the sequence he singled out as “the play of the game” wasn’t even made by anyone on the field.
Rather, it was senior special teams assistant coach Chris Hurd screaming from the sideline that Duke had two players on the field wearing the No. 8 jersey as Illinois punted away a three-and-out to open the second half. Officials caught the penalty, a modest 5-yarder that took on compounding significance as Illinois extended that drive all the way to the end zone and altered the trajectory of what would become Saturday’s 45-19 win.
“That literally changed the game in my opinion,” Bielema said, “because the next play was a big play and that really kind of took the game away from them at that point when we scored there in a really, really huge point in the game.”
The illegal-substitution penalty certainly captured a recurring theme on the afternoon: the Blue Devils making a mistake, and the Fighting Illini capitalizing on it.
Illinois (2-0) led just 14-13 at halftime before outscoring Duke 31-6 in a second-half showing that included rolling to 287 total yards while allowing no sacks, a reversal from a first half in which the Illini were outgained by 108 total yards, had negative yards on the ground and surrendered four sacks.
“I thought that was a crucial play in the game and very much an unforced error that we allowed (them) to take advantage of,” Duke coach Manny Diaz said.
At the time, the Blue Devils (1-1) were buzzing with momentum after Andrel Anthony’s spectacular toe-tap touchdown grab with 8 seconds left in the first half followed by the defense making a third-down stop on Illinois’ first possession after the break.
The Illini punted the ball away, but the mistake had already been made and flagged the double No. 8 jerseys. Redshirt freshman receiver Jayden Moore and redshirt sophomore safety DaShawn Stone were both listed on Duke’s postgame participation chart with that jersey number.
“He puts in hours and hours and hours in our office,” Bielema said of Hurd. “And he starts screaming, ‘There’s two 8s on the field, two 8s on the field!’ … That obviously drew attention to the officials.
“Because a lot of times it happens in special teams where there’s two players with the same numbers and it never gets noticed. Chris Hurd was screaming at it, it had popped up on our scouting report, and he was making a big deal of it.”
Diaz called the sequence “just a panic between two players.”
“There was a guy who should have been in and ran off, and a guy who didn’t even practice in the unit this week (and) sort of stayed on,” Diaz said. “So it was just sort of confusing for everybody because obviously with college football and the double numbers you have to make sure you don’t have. Like I said, I’m responsible for all that.”
Illinois immediately took advantage, with Luke Altmyer connecting downfield with Hank Beatty for a 36-yard gain on the next play. And it ultimately turned into an 11-play, 75-yard drive that ended with Altmyer finding Justin Bowick on a quick 4-yard throw for the 21-13 lead with 9:34 left.
That was the closest the Blue Devils would be the rest of the day as the Illini built their lead. It was part of a day that saw Duke lose five turnovers while forcing none, while Diaz went on to say that penalty essentially amounted to a sixth turnover.
“We had a chance to get the ball back, only down by one and a chance for the first time to really put them under pressure,” Diaz said. “And we lost that.”