Sportswrap is your one-stop shop for everything Duke athletics, where we’ll recap how each of Duke’s sports currently in competition performed over the last week and give a brief look ahead. Here’s our recap for the week of Nov. 28-Dec. 4.
Men’s soccer
No. 7-seed Duke entered its Elite Eight clash with Creighton Saturday with home-field advantage and left it with a gaping statistical advantage, but some of the finest of margins here and there led the Bluejays to the College Cup instead. The 3-2 defeat concludes a Blue Devil season in which they lost just two games and finished the regular season unbeaten, and puts a seal on the college career of Eliot Hamill, among others. Before next fall, Duke awaits announcements for the MAC Hermann Trophy, given annually to the nation’s premier player. -Andrew Long
Men’s basketball
The 17th-ranked Blue Devils bounced back after falling to Purdue in Portland, Ore., defeating No. 25 Ohio State 81-72 Wednesday and unranked Boston College 75-59 Saturday, both wins coming in Cameron Indoor Stadium. Jeremy Roach and Kyle Filipowski spurred Duke (8-2, 1-0 in the ACC) down the stretch against the Buckeyes, while Mark Mitchell led the Blue Devils with 15 points against the Eagles. Next is a trip to the Big Apple for a date against 6-1 Iowa in the Jimmy V Classic Tuesday, and Duke’s final nonconference matchup against Maryland Eastern Shore at home Saturday. -Max Rego
Women’s basketball
Duke picked up its second consecutive win Thursday in the final edition of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, using a strong first-half performance to earn a 66-50 victory Northwestern. While the win was by a significant margin, the Blue Devils (8-1) let the Wildcats narrow the gap in the fourth quarter, giving up 23 points in the final period. The Blue Devils then continued to roll to a massive 100-49 win Sunday against Richmond, scoring 60 points from outside the paint in what was a fundamentally sound but dominant victory. The Blue Devils will go again when Austin Peay visits Thursday. -Martin Heintzelman
Football
The regular season is in the books for the Blue Devils, who were idle on conference championship weekend after finishing one game back of North Carolina in the ACC Coastal Division. It was still a busy week for Duke (8-4, 5-3), though, as first-year head coach Mike Elko earned ACC Coach of the Year honors Thursday before the Blue Devils learned their postseason fate Sunday: Duke is headed to the Military Bowl for a Dec. 28 matchup against UCF in Annapolis, Md., to close its 2022 season once and for all. -Jonathan Levitan
Swimming and diving
The Duke women defeated Queens University of Charlotte 165-92 Saturday to remain undefeated on the season, while the men’s team fell to 2-2 by a score of 94-168. On the women’s side, freshman Kaelyn Gridley and junior Sarah Foley won the 100-yard and 200-yard breaststroke events, respectively. In addition, a pair of Blue Devils swam the fastest 1,000-yard freestyle times of the season, with senior Brendan Driscoll on the men’s side and sophomore Yixuan Chang for the women. Earlier in the week, select members from the team competed in the U.S. Open in Greensboro, N.C. Both Gridley and Foley qualified for the 2024 U.S. Olympic Trials in the 100-meter breaststroke. With her second-place finish in the event, Gridley was the 18 and under US champion. -Ranjan Jindal
Track and field
Duke opened its season in the Visit Winston-Salem College Kick-Off Saturday and showed up in a major way, winning eight events and breaking two meet records. Freshman Lauren Tolbert shattered the record in the women’s 600-meter dash and Gianna Locci broke the record in the women’s long jump with a distance of 5.99 meters. While no long-distance runners ran at the event, Amina Maatoug broke a Duke record in the 3,000-meter race in Boston at the Sharon Colyear-Danville Season Opener with a time of 9:02.73. The Blue Devils will take a hiatus from competition until after the new year, when they travel to Chapel Hill Jan. 14. -Dom Fenoglio
Wrestling
Duke picked up one win and one loss in its trip to Lexington, Va., for a pair of duals against Franklin & Marshall and VMI. In their opening match against Franklin & Marshall, the Blue Devils (2-3) eked out their second win of the season 19-18. Key victories included Jonah Niesenbaum’s 13-2 triumph and Gaetano Console earning a pin in his return to the mat after a knee injury held him out two weeks. Their second outing of the day against VMI was more of a challenge, as the Blue Devils fell 28-9, with three matches lost by three or fewer points. Niesenbaum, junior Patrick Rowland and graduate transfer Jarred Papscy picked up individual wins to cap off the weekend. Duke returns to action Dec. 21 for duals against Presbyterian and George Mason in Clinton, S.C. -Luke Jovanovic
Editor's note: This is the final Sportswrap of 2022. The Chronicle's weekly Duke athletics recap will return in 2023.
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