The No. 14 Blue Devils and No. 8 Terps open the Atlantic Coast Conference schedule with Saturday’s contest at the Konica Minolta Face-Off Classic at M&T Bank Stadium. Here are some game developments that interest me:

1) Both teams want to hang onto the ball and keep it away from the opposing offense, and one way of accomplishing that is winning face-offs. Blue Devils senior Sam Payton has not picked up where he left off last season when he ranked seventh in the country with a .593 percentage. He is 20 of 39, but he won 14 of 19 in Duke’s 15-7 win March 1. On the flip side, Maryland junior Bryn Holmes has been great, claiming 35 of 43 face-offs. But he went just 9 of 19 last year. "He’s dynamite," Blue Devils coach John Danowski said of Holmes. "Those numbers are startling. Sam is gaining experience. He missed a couple weeks of preseason, so he’s getting himself in shape. He’s the guy now who’s taking a lot of draws for us."

2) I’ll have more in tomorrow’s paper on the match-up problems the Terps’ Will Yeatman and Grant Catalino pose on opposing defenses. But as imposing as the 6-foot-6, 260-pound Yeatman and 6-5, 220-pound Catalino are, Duke is no slouch defensively. Senior Ryan McFadyen is 6-6 and 245 pounds, sophomore Tommy Montelli is 6-4 and 215 pounds, junior Parker McKee is 6-2 and 215 pounds, and sophomore Mike Manley is 6-1 and 200 pounds. So Manley barely paused when asked about tackling Yeatman and Catalino. "It doesn’t change anything," he said. "We know our personnel, we know what we’re doing on the defensive end, and we know what we need to do. It doesn’t change anything for us just because they have a 6-foot-5 guy or a 6-foot-6 guy. That doesn’t intimidate us one bit."

3) Both teams are coming off disappointing setbacks: Maryland to Georgetown and Duke to Harvard. And both teams could use a victory before embarking through the meat of their schedules. But if you’re looking for depressed attitudes, you’re looking in the wrong place. "Sometimes it’s good for a team to have some adversity thrown at them early in the season, get a taste of what real life is like," Yeatman said. "So I think although it’s unfortunate that we didn’t come out with the ‘W’, it could help us out in the long run." Said Manley: "Is this a sign of the end of Duke? Not at all. It’s an upset, but we’ll go back to the drawing board and figure things out."