DURHAM — For the first time in Manny Diaz’s three seasons at Duke, the Blue Devils open preseason practice without a starting quarterback in place.

Duke won its first outright ACC football championship since 1962 last year with star Darian Mensah at quarterback. But Mensah made a messy exit to Miami in the offseason, leaving the Blue Devils’ quarterback situation in a state of flux. 

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Duke added San Jose State transfer Walker Eget in the transfer portal and accelerated the timeline for Dan Mahan, who redshirted last season. Both quarterbacks took snaps with the No. 1 offense at Wednesday’s first preseason practice.

“You’ve got one guy [Mahan] who’s got a lot of promise who hasn’t done it yet,” Diaz said. “You’ve got one guy that’s got a lot of production [Eget] who’s just getting into our offense and learning.”

Eget, a 6-foot-3, 235-pound graduate student, spent five seasons at San Jose State, the last two as the team’s primary starter. He played in one game in 2021, three games in 2022 and didn’t play in 2023. Eget was granted a waiver to play in 2026. He threw for more than 5,500 yards and 30 touchdowns in the last two seasons, but played through a right knee injury suffered in October 2024. Eget underwent surgery in the offseason and practiced Tuesday with a heavy brace on the knee.

Mahan, a 6-foot-2, 200-pound redshirt freshman from Burlington, enrolled in January 2025. He has shown flashes in practices and was expected to be a top contender for the job in 2027 after Mensah’s final season in Durham. But that timeline was scrambled.

Diaz said the decision who to start will come down to who can avoid critical mistakes.

“Who minimizes the negative plays that could get us beat,” he said. “Protect the football, decision making, those types of things. Then after that is who can maximize the ways to help us win games.”

Mensah, a transfer from Tulane, threw for 3,973 yards and 34 touchdowns with just six interceptions in his one year at Duke. In the previous season, Maalik Murphy, a Texas transfer, threw for 2,933 yards and 26 touchdowns with 12 interceptions. 

In offensive coordinator Jonathan Brewer’s last six seasons with the current offensive system — which spans his time at Duke, SMU and Miami — six different starting quarterbacks have all averaged at least two touchdown passes per game, Diaz said. It’s a trend Diaz said he’s confident will continue no matter who wins the job.

“Our guys have confidence in how we throw the football,” Diaz said. “We’ve broken school records in two different years with two different styles of quarterback. We have two more different staples of quarterback this year, but I think they see the production and I think our team is excited about whoever it is. But first and foremost, a simple rule, the first rule of winning is don’t beat yourself. So that’ll be the way we evaluate that position.”

The Blue Devils have no timeline for announcing a starter at the spot. Duke, which is 18-9 in the last two seasons, opens its 2026 campaign at home against Tulane on Sept. 5. 

“If it’s an hour before kickoff, that’d be great,” Diaz said. “If it’s anything earlier than that, that’ll be great too.”