The not-so-itsy-bitsy Spiders from the Football Championship Subdivision jumped up and bit somebody from the Atlantic Coast Conference and the Football Bowl Subdivision. On a weekend when Sacramento State was busy beating the Beavers of Oregon State on the West Coast, Richmond’s Spiders bedeviled Duke near the Atlantic Seaboard, traveling to Tobacco Road and coming out of Wallace Wade Stadium in Durham, North Carolina, with an exhilarating victory. The conquest will lift Richmond’s sails for the rest of the season, and the setback will make it hard for Duke to maintain any sort of optimism for its own long road ahead.
 
Kicker Will Snyderwine missed a 28-yard field-goal attempt that would have given Duke the lead with 1:43 remaining. After the Blue Devils, still down by a 23-21 count, managed to force a punt on Richmond's last possession, Snyderwine got one more chance, but the 28-yarder was his chip shot. On the last play of regulation, Snyderwine was sent on to attempt a 60-yard kick, and that wounded duck had no chance. It came up short, as did the Blue Devils in a damaging, dispiriting opener for head coach David Cutcliffe’s crew
.
Richmond did leave the door open for Duke in this game. The Spiders’ own kicker, Remington Hinshaw, missed his extra-point try wide right after teammate Garrett Turner's go-ahead touchdown with just over 10 minutes remaining. Turner’s run came on fourth down, sending the Richmond sideline into complete euphoria, but when the extra point was missed, some of the magic of the moment was lost. The Spiders blunted their own momentum and gave Duke a chance to win the game, not merely tie it, with those two late field goal attempts. Fortunately for the visitors, Snyderwine slipped on the banana peel, allowing this upset to stand.