Despite a Maryland Eastern Shore rally in the late innings Sunday, the baseball team managed to close out the game 8-6 to sweep a three-game series this weekend at Jack Coombs Field.
At the plate, two freshmen showed off their power as Ron Causey and Brett Bartles each hit over .600 on the weekend, and three other freshmen picked up hits.
“Our freshmen today had eight hits. I knew we had brought some power in that freshman class, and they showed it today,” head coach Bill Hillier said after Sunday’s game.
With Duke (4-1) up 3-1 entering the bottom of the fourth, Causey led off the inning with a home run that just barely cleared the fence in left-centerfield. After Bartles doubled to rightfield, another freshman, Jimmy Gallagher, took UMES starter Daniel Sterling long for his first career home run.
In his first career start after making several relief appearances last season, sophomore David Torcise dominated UMES (0-5) on the mound, striking out nine of the 20 batters he faced. But after Torcise came out in the sixth with his pitch count nearing 80, the Fighting Hawks began a comeback run.
“I was a little bit nervous out there,” Torcise said. “But by the second, third and fourth inning, I started calming down and started really focusing on getting into a groove.”
Although comfortably ahead for most of the game, the Blue Devils allowed UMES to come within a swing of a tie in the ninth inning. Inheriting a man on first with no outs from reliever Paul DeMarco, Tony Bajoczky gave up two singles to load the bases. With one out, the go-ahead run was at the plate for the Fighting Hawks, but both Joel Maher and Eric Gaines flied out to rightfield to close out the game.
Although the Fighting Hawks scored three runs in their last at bat, Bajoczky managed to get Duke out of the inning with a win.
“You can’t complain with a sweep ever,” Causey said. “This weekend was really good for us because we got three wins, which is the big thing. At the same time we figured out what it’s going to take to go down and play teams like Wilmington on Wednesday and Cincinnati next weekend.”
Greg Burke, Danny Otero and Torcise started on the mound for the Blue Devils this weekend and collectively gave up five runs in 14 and two-thirds innings over the three games.
The Blue Devils racked up seven runs during the third and fourth innings of the series opener Friday. Adam Murray went 2-for-3 and knocked in three runs in the 11-8 Blue Devil victory. Burke pitched four innings and gave up no earned runs as he picked up his second win of the season.
Murray struck again from the plate in Saturday’s game, going 4-for-4 with two RBIs. With the score tied at two, Murray scored the go-ahead run in the third inning to give the Blue Devils a lead they would maintain until the end.
Although Duke has improved at the plate since last weekend, defense continues to be a sore spot for the Blue Devils. In Friday’s game, Duke committed four errors, allowing UMES six unearned runs—a problem Hillier hopes will improve with time.
“The more we play, the better we’ll get,” Hillier said of his defense. “You just have to get a lot of repetitions in.”
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