Duke agrees to contract extension with head coach Cutcliffe to 2019

Cutcliffe

DU

DURHAM, N.C. — Duke has agreed to a contract extension with coach David Cutcliffe, who has the Blue Devils bowl eligible for the first time in nearly two decades.

The school announced the agreement Wednesday. It will run through June 2019, though contract terms were not released.

The fifth-year coach — who was Peyton Manning’s offensive coordinator at Tennessee and Eli Manning’s head coach at Mississippi — had been mentioned as a possible candidate for several coaching jobs after leading Duke (6-5, 3-4 Atlantic Coast Conference) to bowl eligibility for the first time since 1994. The Blue Devils were also in the mix for the league’s Coastal Division championship into November and close the regular season against Miami (Fla.) this weekend.

In a statement, athletic director Kevin White said school officials are ”extremely excited, if not euphoric!” when looking into the program’s future.

”To be sure, ‘Coach Cut’ represents just a great fit at Duke,” White said. ”David and the staff have done an exemplary job of leading the program while subscribing to the highest institutional ideals, both academically and athletically.”

Cutcliffe took over in December 2007 and has a record of 21-38, which is 11 more wins than the program had managed in the eight seasons before his arrival.

In a statement, Cutcliffe said he and his wife, Karen, ”could not be happier with the people we’ve associated ourselves with here at Duke.”

”We’ve accomplished some of the goals we laid out five years ago,” Cutcliffe said, ”but are nowhere close to where we want to be.”