Tag: AJ Gracia

The Duke baseball team considers what they would shoot at Augusta for Masters week

With The Masters in full swing and golf on everyone’s minds, do any Duke baseball players think they could break 100 at Augusta National? The team posted a short social media clip with the answer.

Duke’s baseball team has three games this weekend, but the entire sports world has golf on its mind during Masters week.

The first men’s golf major is finally here at the iconic course in Augusta, Georgia, and the Blue Devils leaned into the fun by asking some players on the baseball team what they would shoot in a round at Augusta National.

Most of the Duke players interviewed weren’t very optimistic. Six of the eight Blue Devils in the video said they’d shoot something in the triple digits, with freshman AJ Gracia having maybe the most relatable answer.

“At least 100,” Gracia said instead of trying to zero in on an actual score. “At least.”

Two Duke players seemed a little more optimistic about their chances, however. Catcher Alex Stone thinks he can shoot in the mid-90s (though he did emphasize that no one on the roster would be any lower than that). Chase Krewson agreed that he could break 100.

While the tournament goes from Thursday through Sunday this week, the Blue Devils have a three-game road trip to Pittsburgh beginning on Friday.

Three quick takeaways from Duke’s monumental series win over No. 1 Wake Forest

Three takeaways for Duke’s monumental series win over No. 1 Wake Forest.

While it was a tough weekend in Durham for the men’s basketball team as they lost to the North Carolina Tar Heels for the second time this season, another Duke team was making history elsewhere in North Carolina.

Chris Pollard’s team traveled to Winston-Salem for their first ACC matchup. They took on the nation’s No. 1 team, the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. Not only did Duke compete, they won the series two games to one.

The Duke Blue Devils baseball team clinched a series win over a top-ranked team for the first time in 15 years, last occurring when Duke took down a No. 1-ranked North Carolina team.

Friday, Duke won behind an eight-run offensive explosion that saw the Blue Devils touch up one of college baseball’s best pitchers, Josh Hartle. The Blue Devils took that game 8-5.

On Saturday, Tennessee transfer Chase Burns dominated the Blue Devils, striking out 14 Duke batters in 6 innings. Wake went on to even the series after a 6-3 Saturday victory.

Duke clinched the series in the tie-breaking Sunday game behind a six-run fifth inning, which featured two hits and five walks as the Blue Devils extended their lead to 9-2. Wake would fight back, but a late insurance run in the ninth followed by a save from Charlier Beilenson sealed the 10-8 victory.

With the series over, we have three quick takeaways as Duke has become the talk of the college baseball world with the most significant series win of the young season.

This Duke team is dynamic offensively

One of the most significant developments of the season so far is that Duke’s offense is verifiably legit. The pitching was more proven with the caliber of arms the Blue Devils brought back. Still, with Duke losing as many position players as it did, many felt there would be questions about run production and replacing an entire infield.

They’ve gotten contributions from every direction, including freshman AJ Gracia batting over .340 with an OPS of 1.214. Their new-look infield, with four new players spearheaded by Penn transfer Ben Miller, is batting above .290 while combining for 19 homers and 54 RBI. They lit up Hartle, a top-100 pick in this upcoming MLB draft, and on Sunday, they showcased their plate discipline (14 walks) and worked counts as Wake unraveled on the mound.

We’ve seen the Blue Devils put up 20+ runs multiple times this season. It’s safe to say the new look lineup is just fine, and they can do it against elite competition.

Kyle Johnson is starting to carve out a role

The uber-talented two-way freshman Kyle Johnson is finding himself a lane as a bulk innings guy who may just get stretched out to start in some capacity. In the most significant start of his young career, he tossed four innings of two-run ball on Sunday against a potent Wake Forest lineup on the road. He allowed three hits, but he did more than his job as he was competitive and kept Duke in the ball game, ultimately giving his offense time to break the game open in the fifth inning.

He also tossed 65 pitches. If this becomes a thing, the first-year Blue Devil could be stretched out to 80 pitches by mid-April, giving Pollard another pitching weapon to add to his deep arsenal.

Charlie Beilenson is indispensable

Where would Duke be without Charlie Beilenson this season?

Who knows, but his contributions have been immeasurable. When a fire needs to be put out, or he needs to close a ball game, no one is doing it better than Beilenson. He proved that this weekend against the nation’s best as he had not one but two saves to close both Duke wins. He showcased his versatility, too, as he pitched three scoreless innings for the save on Friday. He followed that up with one inning of work on Sunday to preserve a two-run lead and nail down his seventh save of the season.

Duke returns to the friendly confines of Jack Coombs Field this week as they open a six-game homestand with two midweek contests with Rider. The first pitch on Tuesday is scheduled for 4 p.m.

Duke overwhelms George Mason in 11-homer, 23-run offensive display

A home run derby broke out in Durham on Saturday as the Blue Devils launched a program-record 11 homers during a 23-5 victory.

You know, most of the team when a baseball team records five runs and seven hits in a game, it probably feels pretty good about itself at the end of the day.

Not so for George Mason on Saturday in Durham.

The No. 14 Blue Devils won their second straight game to start the season in a mammoth 23-5 win over the Patriots as Duke hit a program-record 11 home runs within one game.

The fireworks came early and often for the Duke team. After George Mason scored one run in the top half of the first, recent Harvard transfer Logan Bravo doubled home the first Blue Devils run of the day.

Duke didn’t stop there.

Freshman AJ Gracia, who got the start in right field on Saturday, stepped into the batter’s box still without a collegiate hit after a three-walk debut against Indiana. He made his first hit a memorable one, launching an absolute moonshot to right field for a three-run home run.

In the very next at-bat, centerfielder Devin Obee bounced a line drive off the center field wall and made his way around for an inside-the-park home run. Just three batters after him, shortstop Wallace Clark and second baseman Zac Morris launched back-to-back shots to give Duke an 8-1 lead before the end of the first.

Gracia didn’t slow down after his three-run jack, either. The freshman came to the plate for his second at-bat of the game in the second inning, again with two runners on base. How does one follow up his first collegiate home run, you may ask? With his second collegiate home run.

If you’re gonna do something twice, however, you might as well do it a third time just for good measure. In the bottom of the seventh, Gracia again pounded a ball over the fence, this time to right-center field with, you guessed it, two runners on base.

Gracia finished his second collegiate game with four hits, three home runs, and nine RBIs.

Obee also decided that an inside-the-park home run wasn’t quite the same as the firepower his teammates were showing off, so he decided to hit another home run in the sixth inning, this time the old-fashioned way by powering a ball over the left-field fence.

The Patriots kept adding runs wherever they could, scoring two more in the top of the third and another in the top of the seventh, but Duke had 13 runs by the end of the third inning.

Not to be outdone by his classmate Gracia, freshman Kyle Johnson tossed three scoreless innings from the fourth through the sixth in his first appearance on the mound in Durham.

The Blue Devils kept the fireworks show going in the seventh inning when third baseman Ben Miller fired an opposite-field bomb for Duke’s eighth home run of the game, a new program record. Gracia’s third homer followed, as did Morris’s second to give the Blue Devils 10 home runs in the first seven innings.

Freshman Chase Krewson joined in on his classmates’ fun right at the buzzer, knocking a ball over the right-field fence into the parking lot for the 11th and final home run of the day.

The offensive explosion added up to a 23-5 victory for Duke and a second straight win to open the season. The Blue Devils end their opening weekend on Sunday against No. 18 Coastal Carolina at 3:00 p.m. ET.