It is often called the rarest feat in baseball: The perfect game. Duke's Kevin Thompson came as close to perfection as possible Sunday.
With two outs in the seventh and final inning of the first game of a doubleheader against Buffalo at Jack Coombs Field, the scoreboard was filled with zeros for the Bulls.
Twenty Buffalo hitters had come to bat against Thompson, and twenty had been retired. With a full count on catcher Brandon DiCesare, one strike away from etching his name in the record books, Thompson delivered to the plate--and watched the ball sail into rightfield for a single, taking with it not only Thompson's bid for perfection, but also his no-hitter.
"I've never been in a situation before where there's so much emotion, so much excitement riding on one pitch," said Thompson, who struck out 10 of the 22 Bulls hitters he faced. "I made a bad pitch, and the hitter made me pay for it. I was really upset with myself... but it turned out okay, I guess."
Thompson's near-perfect day, the highlight of Duke's 10-0 romp, was one of several stellar pitching performances for the Blue Devils this
In a pair of weekend doubleheaders, Duke (7-6) avenged a tough loss in the series opener by allowing only five runs in winning the next three games.
"We should've won [all] four," head coach Bill Hillier said. "[But] I'm pleased with how we bounced back after the first game [Saturday], because that was a tough loss. Everyone took that one hard."
In the second game Sunday, Duke hung on to win, 3-2, after allowing things to get interesting late in the game.
The Blue Devils entered the seventh and final inning clinging to a 3-1 lead, as Justin Dilucchio, Jim Perry and Zach Schreiber had combined to allow only three Buffalo hits.
The Bulls led off the inning with consecutive singles off Schreiber, Duke's closer, putting the tying run on base.
After a flyout and a strikeout, Buffalo shortstop Joe Mihalics lined a 3-2 pitch into centerfield, staving off defeat by putting the Bulls within one with a runner on second.
With the game on the line, designated hitter Phil Vanhorne sent a long, towering flyball to center, but Duke centerfielder Senterrio Landrum was able to retreat and make the catch, not far from the wall, giving the Blue Devils a chance to exhale.
In Saturday's second game, senior Jeff Alleva held the Bulls scoreless through six innings, and rightfielder Brian Patrick paced the offense with three hits, including a triple, and two runs scored as the Blue Devils cruised to an 8-3 victory.
The three consecutive wins were satisfying retribution for Duke following a discouraging loss in Saturday's first game, when the Blue Devils gave up an early five-run lead and Buffalo scored in the top of the ninth to win, 7-6.
While the Blue Devils won 3-of-4 on the weekend to push their record back above .500, and saw several encouraging outings by their starting pitchers, the talk after the series understandably focused on Thompson's oh-so-close to perfect game, which evoked memories of some of the most infamously tantalizing lost bids in baseball history.
"That's as nervous as I've been in a long time in coaching," Hillier said. "It's great [just] to be a part of that. I've never been in a dugout where a guy got so close to a perfect game. It's unbelievable."
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