It has been 711 days since Elon’s football team won a non-conference game.

Which becomes stranger when you realize the Phoenix went 6-2 in one of the two best FCS conferences last season.

Elon is coming off a 6-5 season in which it did everything in the Coastal Athletic Association to warrant an FCS playoff berth. But going winless in its non-conference schedule — including a 20-point loss at Wake Forest to start the season — put a damper on its season.

Here are five things to know about the Phoenix ahead of Friday night’s game:

How many players who were teammates of running back Zamir White at Georgia do you think are still playing college football?

Elon has one in quarterback Matthew Downing, who was a freshman at Georgia in 2018 (and played in four games).

The seventh-year QB has had a nomadic college career and is entering his final season of eligibility. He left Georgia after one season and spent three years at TCU, redshirting in 2019 (back when transfers had to sit out a season) and starting a game in 2020. He left TCU after the 2021 season and went to Louisiana Tech, where he also started one game.

Downing’s breakthrough came last year with the Phoenix — only after he started the opener at Wake Forest and was benched. He entered as the backup in the second game and held onto the starting role for the rest of the season, completing 125 of 216 passes (57.9%) for 1,915 yards (8.9 yards/attempt), throwing 19 touchdowns and only four interceptions.

The bulk of his production came in the last four games; Downing was 60-for-106 with 1,176 yards and 12 touchdowns without throwing an interception.

“I mean, that’s as good as anybody, anywhere,” Duke coach Manny Diaz said of Downing’s closing stretch.

Two returners aside from Downing, one on each side of the ball, stand out for Elon.

One is receiver Chandler Brayboy. He’s a 6-1, 199-pound redshirt senior who led Elon in receiving yards (589) despite trailing the team leader in catches by 10. His average per catch was 19.6 yards and he had four touchdowns.

He gets the ball in his hands in a variety of ways. Brayboy had 117 yards and a touchdown rushing last year, and has 1,003 career kick return yards.

Caleb Curtain is a redshirt junior safety who was Elon’s leading tackler last season (80 stops). He was a first-team All-CAA pick, adding 6.5 TFLs, 4.5 sacks and four interceptions — one of which was a pick-6 against Wake Forest.

Given the state of college football, it’s a little surprising — to an outsider — Elon was able to retain both players.

If football games are won and lost on third downs, it’s a little bit of a wonder Elon had a winning record last year.

The Phoenix was 45-for-149 (29.8%) on third downs, which was 115th out of 122 teams on the FCS level.

You can offset third-down woes with fourth-down conversions, and Elon was 14-for-26 on fourth downs. But losses against Wake Forest (2-for-16), N.C. A&T (0-for-13) and Villanova (1-for-9) highlight how awful Elon’s offense was on third downs.

Diaz has been on a college staff every season since 1998, across nine programs, and in a few different regions of the country.

He’s going to have some familiarity with opposing staffs.

This week’s connection goes all the way back — “many moons ago,” he said — to when Diaz was at N.C. State between 2000-05. Elon’s defensive coordinator, Dovonte Edwards, was at N.C. State during the same time Diaz was there.

Except Diaz and Edwards weren’t on the same staff — that was during Edwards’ playing career. He started his career as a receiver with the Wolfpack before playing his last two seasons at cornerback; Diaz wasn’t his position coach for those years, but he was the Wolfpack’s linebackers coach and then safeties coach for the years that Edwards was playing defense.

Elon has a few wins in its history against programs that have transitioned to the FBS level but has never notched a win against a member of college football’s highest level.

There have been chances. The closest was probably two seasons ago, when Elon lost at Vanderbilt 42-31. After giving up three touchdowns to start the game and trailing 35-10 early in the third quarter, the Phoenix cut the deficit to 11 twice before the game ended.

That script was similar to last year’s opener at Wake Forest. The Phoenix trailed 27-0 at halftime, and then struck with a long touchdown run and pick-6 in the third quarter to tighten the game.

So, based on that recent history, Duke needs to keep pressing the accelerator if it gets up by multiple scores.