This should not have happened.
Duke traveled to Georgia Tech (18-8, 4-2 in the ACC), which began the series undefeated in conference and ranked 14th nationally. But Duke (11-21, 2-4) shocked the college baseball world as it won the series, beating the heavily favored Yellow Jackets twice.
The only people not shocked by the result are the Blue Devils themselves.
"It's something we knew we were capable of," Brad Dupree said. "We've just been waiting for it to happen."
The series closed as a resounding success, but it certainly did not open that way. In the opening game, the Blue Devils got pounded. Georgia Tech scored 14 runs on 15 hits, and every indication had Duke dropping yet another ACC matchup.
Something happened overnight, though, because the Blue Devil team that showed up on Saturday was not the one that got hammered the night before.
In the 4-3 victory, Duke never trailed. The Blue Devils opened up the scoring in the top half of the first, when a single from freshman catcher Troy Caradonna knocked home David Mason.
Duke extended the lead to 2-0 in the fourth inning, and Jeff Becker scored on a wild pitch to push the lead to 3-0 in the fifth. But the Yellow Jackets had no intention of going down without a fight.
In the bottom half of the inning they scored a pair of runs, and it looked as though Duke's first ACC victory might slip away.
This worry proved unfounded as Caradonna racked-up his second RBI single in the seventh, and starting pitcher Ryan Caradonna and reliever Dupree survived another Georgia Tech run to make the lead stand up and seal the victory.
Yesterday afternoon, the Blue Devils demonstrated a wacky characteristic of sports-winning is contagious.
Victory came in a similar fashion as the day before. Duke got on top early, and quality pitching made the lead hold up.
The Blue Devils first drew blood in the fourth inning, and the score was 2-1 going into the seventh inning when Duke scored the two runs that proved to be enough for the victory.
While those runs were enough, the game had anything but a quiet finish.
Kevin Perry gave up the second run of his outing on a Mark Teixeira homer in the bottom of the seventh, and Dupree gave up an RBI single in the eighth.
This, however, was the Blue Devils' weekend. Dupree held on for the save and Duke walked away with a second 4-3 victory and its first successful ACC series of the season.
"It definitely made the team realize that we're capable of winning every game," Dupree said.
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