IMAGN VIA REUTERS
Jul 28, 2026 10:20 PM
The 2026 ACC Football Media Poll is officially out, and here is where the Duke Blue Devils are projected to finish.
The Duke Blue Devils are coming off one of their best football seasons in a while in the 2025 season.
After winning a tiebreaker, Duke was able to upset Virginia in overtime of the 2025 Atlantic Coast Conference title game. From there, they won their bowl game to finish the season strong. While Duke was looking to bring that confidence into the offseason, things took a turn when Darian Mensah opted to transfer to Miami at the last minute.
Now, Duke's chances to repeat took a hit.
With the season just over a month away, the preseason polls for the upcoming campaign are officially being released. The latest is the preseason ACC media poll which was taken last week during the ACC Kickoff event in Charlotte.
As the results are now out, the Blue Devils are being picked in the bottom half of the league, finishing at No. 10 in the media poll. Take a look at the full poll below:
| Rank | Team | Points |
| 1. | Miami (165) | 3159 |
| 2. | SMU (6) | 2794 |
| 3. | Louisville (4) | 2569 |
| 4. | Clemson (7) | 2520 |
| 5. | Georgia Tech (2) | 2006 |
| 6. | Virginia | 1981 |
| 7. | NC State | 1964 |
| 8. | Virginia Tech | 1962 |
| 9. | Pitt | 1740 |
| 10. | Duke | 1452 |
| 11. | Florida State (3) | 1439 |
| 12. | California | 1392 |
| 13. | Wake Forest | 1103 |
| 14. | Syracuse | 878 |
| 15. | North Carolina | 831 |
| 16. | Boston College | 491 |
| 17. | Stanford (1) | 483 |
First-place votes in parentheses. The poll was conducted by a total of 188 media members from the ACC Kickoff event. As you see above, the Blue Devils received 1,452 total points, which was just ahead of Florida State, which finished with 1,439. Oddly enough, the Seminoles received three first-place votes.
Miami is the clear favorite to win the conference and Mensah is a big reason why. He replaces Carson Beck who helped lead the Hurricanes to the College Football Playoff title game last season.
By upgrading with Mensah, Miami should be a national title contender once again this season.
On the Duke side of things, they are going to have to prove a lot of doubters wrong this season. It's always tough to repeat but with the media being so low on the Blue Devils, it could give them some more bulletin board material for the upcoming season.
Manny Diaz and his staff have their work cut out for them and have interesting position battles, including at quarterback.
Duke will open up the 2026 season on September 5th hosting Tulane in what will be a rematch of a thrilling game from last season.
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