With Atlantic Coast Conference media days happening later this week, outlets are starting to release their preseason predictions for the upcoming season.

Fall camps will begin at the end of July for some programs and before you know it, football will be on our TV's. For the Duke Blue Devils, they are coming off one of their best seasons in recent memory, winning the ACC title by beating Virginia in overtime. 

From there, the Blue Devils won their bowl game and took some momentum into this offseason. However, things got sour when quarterback Darian Mensah left the program and joined Miami instead. While Manny Diaz has another starter at quarterback, it will be very tough to replace a talent like Mensah. 

And some experts believe the Blue Devils will finish in the bottom half of the ACC.

Earlier this week, Phil Steele revealed his rankings for the the ACC in the 2026 campaign. He had the Blue Devils ranked No. 11 in his rankings.  And now, another publication has them low as well. 

On Tuesday, USA TODAY released their preview for the ACC. In the preview, they rank the Duke Blue Devils No. 12 in the conference. The only teams worse are No. 13 Wake Forest, No. 14 North Carolina, No. 15 Syracuse, No. 16 Stanford and No. 17 Boston College. 

Below is the full ranking:

To make matters worse, they named Mensah as their newcomer of the year for joining Miami. That hurts. 

There was some good news for Duke, however. Linebacker Luke Mergott and punter Kade Reynolds were named honorable mention. Duke did not have a player on the preseason All-ACC team from the publication. 

This is a good chance for Diaz to give his team some more bulletin board material ahead of the upcoming season. Maybe Duke can shock not only the ACC but the rest of the national media this year.