Despite winning two games in the ACC tournament, and therefore matching its conference win total during the regular season, the men's baseball team's quest for a league championship was derailed last week in a 23-4 shellacking at the hands of No. 10 Georgia Tech (41-16).
"I knew after six hitters that we were in trouble," head coach Bill Hillier said after the game last week. "I think it was 5-0 at that point."
The Yellow Jackets were fired up early on, piling on nine runs in the first inning en route to the victory for the eventual ACC champions.
"We took control early," Georgia Tech head coach Danny Hall said. "We got contributions from a lot of people. This is the kind of day that you like to have."
Hillier tried to shake things up by changing pitchers often, going through three hurlers in the first two innings alone, including starter Kevin Thompson, Zach Schreiber and Justin Dilluchio. Dilluchio remained in the game for four innings.
"I told my guys that we have to give credit to Georgia Tech," Hillier said. "They hit everything we threw. In the first inning we kicked it around a little bit. We just don't play consistently."
In the end, Georgia Tech set an all-time team high for runs in a tournament game, and was just one off the conference record. However, the 19-run margin of victory did break the ACC tournament mark.
"We went into the game knowing we had a job to do," Georgia Tech's Jeremy Slayden said. "We felt like we could bat Duke and that we were better than them. We had to get the job done and we did it."
In the previous game, the Blue Devils (18-36) collected a remarkable 7-4 win over No. 17 Clemson, which eliminated the Tigers from the tournament. It was Duke's second win over Clemson in 2003.
The victory was manufactured in two parts: a seven-run second inning from Duke's offense, and a stellar pitching performance from sophomore Tim Layden.
"Every time you step onto the field, you have something to prove," Layden said. "And, regardless of your record or ERA, you are going to go out there and battle. Today, I just basically did that and went out there and threw out the stats and record book and pitched and got the ball down."
Layden struck out a career high eight eight batters, as he held the Tigers to just one run in the first six innings.
"Tim Layden is the main reason we are sitting here as winners," Hillier said.
In the second inning onslaught, Duke played opportunistically, capitalizing on two Clemson errors and a pair of bases-loaded walks. In addition, Layden and senior Troy Caradonna each had two hits, while senior Brian Patrick collected two RBIs with a two-run single.
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