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Maybe Duke coach David Cutcliffe still thinks he's back at Tennessee, coaching Peyton Manning. Or maybe he still thinks he's at Mississippi, coaching Peyton's brother Eli.

Or maybe he is just a really optimistic guy.

"I believe we'll be a bowl team," Cutcliffe said at the ACC's recent preseason media gathering in Greensboro, N.C.

A bowl? Duke? The Blue Devils haven't played in a bowl game since the Hall of Fame Bowl in January 1995 -- their only bowl appearance of the 1990s, and one of only two they have made since Dwight Eisenhower left the White House.

Duke is known as a school where the basketball team makes the postseason, not the football team. Quarterback Thaddeus Lewis isn't exactly the Big Man on Campus.

"All the basketball players [are] the Big Man on Campus," Lewis said with a grin. "C'mon, it's Duke. It's basketball country."

Cutcliffe led the Blue Devils to a 4-8 record last fall, a nice improvement from 1-11 under ex-coach Ted Roof in 2007. It was Duke's highest win total since a 4-8 season in 2003.

"From Day 1, when he stopped us and said we're the slowest, fattest team he's ever seen, we've been working to not be the slowest, fattest team he's ever seen," Lewis said.

But Duke again seems like a long shot to make it to a bowl. Duke has not won more than two ACC games in any season this decade. Two of the Blue Devils' four nonleague games this year are against Division I-AA foes, but the school will only be able to count one of them toward the six wins it needs to be bowl eligible.

Still, Cutcliffe is confident.

"I looked at our football team this spring and as a coach evaluated, 'This is a bowl team. This is a good football team,' " Cutcliffe said.

"Listen, we were a good football team a year ago, and if we had a head coach that's worth a durn, we'd have been a bowl team. And that's the truth. I still stay up at night thinking about a couple games that as a coach you've got to manage better.

"We should have been 6-6 at worst last year. ... I want to see us be a good team with a good record. Last year we were a good team with a bad record. ... You've got to beat good teams in the fourth quarter, which we weren't able to do."

Duke lost five games by 11 points or fewer last year.

The Blue Devils return only five offensive starters, but one of them is Lewis, who threw for 2,171 yards and made the All-ACC second team as a junior last fall.

"Not only is he ... communicating with us intelligently; he's able to coach and teach our young players," said Cutcliffe, a former Tennessee offensive coordinator and Ole Miss head coach. "One of the things that's so critical in football is communication.

"It's like what Peyton and Eli do so well with their guys -- they hone their guys to be where they expect them to be. And Thad couldn't verbalize that to his receivers a year ago because he didn't know it. Now he's understanding it."

Duke also will benefit from the return of running back Re'quan Boyette, who missed all of last season because of knee surgery.

But the Blue Devils must replace All-ACC receiver Eron Riley, who caught 61 passes as a senior.

"I have more than just one guy to throw to this year," Lewis said. "I don't even know who my go-to guy's going to be because I have such talent to throw to."