DURHAM – Duke All-ACC linebacker Tre Freeman knows how to pick his spots while finding an inconsistent football program on the upswing.
When his family relocated from Georgia to Durham in 2017, Northern Durham wasn’t one of the Bull City’s traditionally strong high school programs. Before he arrived, the Knights were coming off a 5-7 season – their fourth straight losing record.
In Freeman’s time at Northern, the Knights finished 9-3, 11-2 and 8-3 and advanced to the postseason. But during his career across town at Duke, the Knights have slipped back to 2-8, 2-8, 2-8 and 1-7.
The pendulum has swung with a similar arc since Freeman donned the Blue Devils’ colors.
Freeman was recruited as a three-star prospect in the 2021 class when the Blue Devils were coming off a 2-9 record. Duke finished 3-9 during his freshman year, which preserved as a redshirt season by limiting him to four games.
Since then, Duke has gone 9-4 and 8-5 under Mike Elko and 9-4 in 2024 under Manny Diaz. Freeman earned second-team All-ACC in 2023 and honorable mention All-ACC in 2024.
“I wanted to say close to home,” said Freeman when he met with the media Monday after practice. “Fifteen minutes down the road is not bad. It’s been a great journey, and I’ve loved every minute of it. The academics and the football you can get at the same time is the main reason I picked Duke.”
Duke opened practice for its second season under Diaz in preparation for the season opener against Elon. Duke faces the Football Championship Subdivision member in a Thursday night game on August 28 at Wallace Wade Stadium.
For many years a Durham kid wanting to stay home couldn’t be confident he would play for a winning team in the friendly confines of Wallace Wade. There was the nadir of 2-33 from 2005 through 2007 before David Cutcliffe returned in 2008. Cutcliffe recorded a stretch of respectability – with a high-water mark of 10-4 in 2013 — before the downturn of losing records in the final three years of his 14 seasons in Durham.
When Diaz was a candidate for the job to replace Elko, he learned the school wanted to commit more resources. Diaz addressed that transformation with one of his more interesting and overlooked comments last week during the ACC Kickoff. Cutcliffe’s final record at Duke was 77-97 over 14 seasons.
“I think what we have been able to accomplish, because of our administration giving full support to make Duke football excellent, is for a long time the decision to come to Duke was you know you’re going to get the elite academics,” Diaz said. “With those elite academics, that’s going to set you up for life after football, which everyone is going to face at some point. And those two things are still true.
“The question was can I compete for championships, and can I get to the National Football League? Maybe there’s an idea like, well, you know what, I’m going to go for the academics, and maybe I’m going to settle a little bit on the football side. I think, whether it’s this past recruiting class but most importantly it’s the guys in our locker room, guys on the stage, they believe that you can accomplish all four things now here at Duke.
“To be honest, there’s not very many schools in the country where you can really go 4 for 4. You can compete for championships and go to the National Football League, but you’re not getting an education that’s going to help you in life after school. You may get a piece of paper that says you graduated from college, there’s plenty of those getting passed out, but that doesn’t mean you have a proper education.”
Fifth-year offensive tackle Justin Pickett, a Freeman classmate, also spoke on the increased expectations when he met with the media.
“We’re the last group of seniors in their fifth year who understand the struggle of where Duke football was when we started,” said Pickett of Carmel, Indiana. “It’s super exciting. We see where the program is and where it will be after we’re gone.
“A 9-4 record is the bar now. We don’t want anything less than that. We’re going to push to excel. We want to be in the college football playoff, and we want to be in Charlotte for the ACC Championship game.”
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