Cut Quotes -

Kudo's to fans -

I think this is a great start to the 2009 year.  Our fan base is significant in recruiting.  These kids came officially or unofficially to ball games and felt and sensed the enthusiasm surrounding Duke Football.

On High School coaches -

This has been the most enjoyable year I have had dealing with high school coaches.  We disrupt his day and are on the

phones with him constantly and they are unselfish concerning the young men that play for him.

On in state LOI's -

There are nine players out of this class from the state of North Carolina and their coaches have been awesome.

Emphasis -

What I call the emphasis of this class was on speed and skill and what I call size and skill.  What I mean by that is it's an emphasis on movement, and emphasis on being able to move your feet.  Football is a game of movement and collision.  When identifying football players, they show that.  If they can't run and hit then they don't belong at this level.

Balance of Class -

Our class is balanced - four defensive linemen and four offense lineman and the rest we have listed at backs.   We have our reason for listing them that way because anything can happen, you're not sure where they'll end up.  A large group of linebackers which was an emphasis for us - great balance and tons of speed.

On looking for discipline -

We looked for disciplined and conditioning.  I don't like poorly conditioned players and the programs they came from many of them competed for state championships.  They're disciplined young men from disciplined families.  I really pay attention to the conditioning level.  We are asking them to pick that up a notch now that they are in our fold and I expect him to do that.  Most importantly, some great people.  I'm excited and appreciative of what we've done.  There is a board upstairs and it's easy to write there names on the board, but it took a lot of work by a lot of people to get to that point.  We had 27 names and got all of them.

On how the staff has been received -

You would be shocked at the reception we got.  The energy and enthusiasm surrounding Duke Football has carried over.  Hey, we go into Central Florida and people are saying congratulations, yall are back.  We go to New Jersey and hear the same thing ... Detroit, Michigan and California.  I probably owe Mike Krzyzewski thanks because he makes everybody in the sports world aware of Duke.

More on in state recruiting -

We are doing a pretty extensive study and the teams with success recruit well within a 200 mile radius.  We are going to recruit North Carolina very had and North Carolina is very worthy of being recruited.  There's a lot of good football players that will be 2010 and 2011 graduates.

**We'll bring you part II shortly.  Stay tuned for more coverage on the class of 2009 for Duke Football