While Duke has a number of injuries to watch this week, the biggest change on the Blue Devils’ depth chart isn’t injury related. Jay Hollingsworth will start at running back this week against Wake Forest, Duke coach David Cutcliffe announced Tuesday.

“I was really disappointed in our run game, but mostly with our running backs,” Cutcliffe said. “Our offensive line gave us some opportunities that didn’t occur just because we didn’t run the football well. … (Hollingsworth) ran the ball than everyone else did. He deserves it.”

Hollingsworth had 21 yards on four carries Saturday. Desmond Scott led Duke with 66 yards on 10 carries and Juwan Thompson had one yard on six carries.

Going into Saturday’s opener against Elon, Duke coach David Cutcliffe threatened to run the ball more than the Blue Devils did in any game last season. He was true to his word, calling 45 runs and using five different backs.

With Desmond Scott leading the way in a 41-27 win over Elon, the Blue Devils ran for 192 yards and three touchdowns, one each for Scott, Jay Hollingsworth and true freshman Josh Snead.

“That’s a pretty decent game, but we can do much better than what we did,” said Scott, a sophomore from Durham.

WINSTON-SALEM — Tony Jackson and Jay Hollingsworth squeezed out a total of 130 yards on the ground on Saturday against a Wake Forest defense that had been holding teams to about 91 per game. It's a good number considering Duke managed just 28 at Vanderbilt last weekend.

But the number was not as impressive as how the sophomore and true freshman got those yards. Mostly Jackson and Hollingsworth were able to pound between the tackles and go up the gut, especially during a 10-play, 70-yard scoring drive late in the third quarter that turned a 19-14
deficit into a 20-19 lead.