Congratulations to Carl Franks, who got a three-year extension from AD Joe Alleva. Franks has been in a very difficult hole, and has slowly worked his way towards being able to compete with most ACC teams. He was willing to take on a tough job that not many would have taken, and has Duke very close to being a decent football team again.
Alleva hit, we thought, the right points in his comments on the extension:
"WeÂve gone from losing games by 30 points to losing games by two, three and four points. ThatÂs the first step. YouÂve got to crawl before you walk, and youÂve got to walk before you run."
That strikes us as a smart approach, and it's also smart to say that Duke needs to get out of the habit of keeping a coach for four years and then dumping him. It's a novelty to think that Duke could have someone for seven years. Here's hoping the improvement continues.