Duke head coach Chris Pollard hoped last Tuesday’s win against Liberty would be a “coming-out party” for his offense, and one week later, the Blue Devil bats still have not cooled off.
Duke rallied from a four-run deficit to beat UNC Greensboro 7-4 Tuesday at Jack Coombs Field, scoring six of its seven runs with two outs to extend its winning streak to three games. Sophomore Justin Bellinger was 3-for-4 with three RBIs to lead the Blue Devils, and freshman center fielder Jimmy Herron added two doubles from the leadoff spot in the order.
“I’m not sure that we were tough enough to do that a couple of weeks ago. It’s just a product of the maturation of our team and guys growing up and learning how to compete,” Pollard said. “I’m really proud of our club tonight, especially the job that we did there with two outs.”
Trailing by one in the bottom of the seventh, Duke (15-14) had runners on first and second with two outs when freshman Zack Kone hit a grounder to first baseman Michael Goss that looked like it would end the inning. But Goss booted the ball into foul territory as Kone reached first safely to load the bases, and sophomore Peter Zyla lined a game-tying single into left field to complete the Blue Devil rally.
Sophomore Michael Smiciklas then drew a bases-loaded walk to put Duke in front 5-4, and the Blue Devils tacked on two insurance runs in the eighth when Herron doubled to the gap in left-center field to lead off the frame and sophomore Max Miller and Bellinger followed with RBI singles.
UNC Greensboro (23-7) struck first with four runs in the fifth inning on just two hits, as most of the damage was self-inflicted by the Blue Devils. Junior Ben Spitznagel hustled down the line to lead off the frame with an infield single, and 6-foot-10 southpaw James Ziemba walked the bases loaded. Spitznagel waltzed home for the first run of the contest on a wild pitch in the dirt, forcing Pollard to turn to senior Nick Hendrix in his bullpen.
After a sacrifice fly doubled the Spartan lead, junior Ryne Sigmon lined an RBI single that glanced off sophomore Jack Labosky’s glove at third base. Sigmon advanced to third on a botched pickoff play and scored UNC Greensboro’s final run of the inning on a passed ball.
“You give up four-spots in baseball,” Pollard said. “You have to grind your way through it, you have to get off the field, you have to minimize it and then you have to be tough enough to have an answer.”
The Spartans boast one of the nation’s most high-powered offenses, but matched their lowest scoring output of the season as Duke relievers Kevin Lewallyn, Labosky and Mitch Stallings—who recorded his second save of the year—shut them down the rest of the way.
Duke had an immediate response to the Spartans’ big inning in the bottom of the fifth, staging a two-out rally to trim the deficit to one. Sophomore Ryan Day singled on a slow roller to third base with one out, and advanced to second on a groundout before he crossed the plate when freshman catcher Chris Proctor roped a single into right. After a hit batter and a walk loaded the bases, Bellinger sliced a two-run double down the left-field line to get his team back in the game.
“I’m just looking for away pitches off-speed because I know that’s what they’re going to give me. They’re not going to challenge me with fastballs inside,” Bellinger said. “Playing here in a little bit deeper of a park, my mentality is just to hit the ball hard on a line and just score runs—[with] guys in scoring position, expect off-speed, expect bad pitches, and that’s what I got.”
The Blue Devils nearly tied the game in the sixth when a throw from third baseman Collin Woody skipped into right field on a ground ball by Herron, and Smiciklas tried to score on a mad dash from first base. The relay from Goss to the plate beat him by a hair to end the inning, but Duke had to wait just one inning to seize the lead.
Graduate student Trent Swart started on the mound for the Blue Devils in his first appearance since March 19 after elbow irritation sidelined him for two straight weekend starts. Swart missed all of the 2015 season recovering from Tommy John surgery, but tossed 42 pitches in three scoreless innings Tuesday and showed no signs of rust. Pollard will hope to have him back in a bigger role during the last few weeks of his career.
“He feels really good. I think his stuff looked really live. The thing to me that told me that his arm feels good is how good the breaking ball was,” Pollard said. “That’s the hardest pitch to throw if you don’t feel good, and his breaking ball was maybe as good tonight as it’s been all year.”
The Blue Devils will look to continue their momentum in a critical series against No. 21 Clemson this weekend at Coombs.
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