CLEMSON — For the first time all afternoon, it appeared Clemson had stopped Duke on fourth down.

Facing a 4th and 10 from the Clemson 18, Derian Mensah’s pass to Que’Sean Brown fell incomplete. All of a sudden, a flag came flying in from the back of the field. The call was defensive pass interference on Avieon Terrell. One look at the replay showed Terrell was actually shoved to the ground by Brown. If the right call is made, the Tigers win.

Instead of a Clemson victory, Duke scored two plays later, then converted a 2-point conversion for a 46-45 win. The loss extends the Tigers’ home losing streak against Power-4 teams to six games, a streak that stretches back more than a year.

Cade Klubnik and the offense exploded for more than 500 yards of offense, with the senior quarterback having one of the best passing days of his career.

The performance comes in Klubnik’s return to the field after the signal caller missed the loss to SMU with an ankle injury. It also came on the right day, seeing as Clemson’s leaky secondary allowed seven passing plays of more than 15 yards or more. Three of those were for 40 yards or more.

Duke Receivers Abused Clemson Safeties

Cooper Barkate and Que’Sean Brown had their way with the Tigers’ secondary, routinely exposing Clemson’s deficiencies at safety. Duke QB Darien Mensah picked on Ronan Hanafin and Tink Kelley at times.

The safeties were responsible for multiple busts, with several just flat-out getting beaten in man coverage. The issues led to a lot of finger-pointing on the field. Saturday was a prime example of why Tom Allen has been so hesitant to do a lot of blitzing. The Tigers just can’t hold up on the backend in man coverage.

Clemson Receivers Step Up

Quarterback Cade Klubnik did a really good job of spreading the ball around in his return from injury. The senior threw for a career-high 383 yards, with seven different players catching a pass. It is the ninth time Klubnik has gone over the 300-yard mark in his career, moving him into fourth all-time in that category in Clemson history.

No Bryant Wesco, no problem, as Antonio Williams, TJ Moore and Tristan Smith all stepped up in Wesco’s absence. Smith added 79 yards on six catches.

Williams had 152 all-purpose yards and two touchdowns. Moore had 92 receiving yards, including a 75-yard touchdown, his second 75-yard score of the season.

Gid Is That Dude

Nothing against Adam Randall, he has been more than serviceable and was really good against Duke, but Gideon Davidson gives the Clemson running game something it doesn’t have with Randall—an ability to make the most out of nothing.

It’s hard to fathom why these two backs haven’t been more of a duo going back to week two. The two combined for more than 150 rushing yards on Saturday. Davidson has such good vision. One more thing he brings to the table that Randall doesn’t, the threat to take it to the house whenever he touches the ball.