Duke baseball weekend recap

Duke wasted little time — and saved some innings — in sweeping a doubleheader against Longwood in baseball on Sunday at Jack Coombs Field.

The Blue Devils beat Longwood 23-3 and 11-1 in their first games since last weekend’s series against Florida State, with each game ending in the seventh inning because of the 10-run rule.

Duke (32-14) had a week off because of final exams. The Blue Devils go to East Carolina — in the running for a national seed at 37-8 entering the second game of a doubleheader on Sunday — for a mid-week game Tuesday, and then head to Georgia Tech for an ACC series next weekend.

Here is a recap of both games on Sunday:

In the first game, this was a tight game before a four-run fifth inning by Duke.

And then a marathon, 15-run sixth inning meant the game could end two innings early. Eleven of the 15 runs came with two outs.

The Blue Devils sent 20 batters to the plate in the sixth. Alex Stone had two hits in the inning; the first started the scoring and was an RBI double, and the second was a grand slam.

Devin Obee hit a three-run homer in the inning — part of his two-homer game, with a solo shot in the fourth — and Andrew Yu had a two-run single. AJ Gracia walked to drive in a run, going along nicely with his three-run homer earlier in the game.

Obee also drove in a run in the fifth, and Wallace Clark had a three-run double in that inning, which made it 8-3 before Duke’s sixth-inning explosion.

Kyle Johnson started for Duke, going 4 2/3 innings and allowing three runs on seven hits and four walks. Ryan Higgins (1-1) got the last out of the fifth and pitched a scoreless sixth, and Aidan Weaver pitched a scoreless seventh to end the game.

In the second game, Duke didn’t have or need quite the same type of offensive explosion as it did in the first game and still pushed through a mercy-rule win.

The Blue Devils got five runs in the first, on an RBI groundout by Stone, a throwing error on a stolen base, and then on a three-run triple by Clark.

Duke scored two more in the second on another RBI groundout (again by Stone) and a single by Logan Bravo.

Duke gave up a run in the third and scored a run later in the inning. The Blue Devils got three runs in the fourth on two bases-loaded walks and a sacrifice fly by Zac Morris.

The Blue Devils’ Friday night starter, Jonathan Santucci (6-1), started this game but only pitched two innings. He gave up a leadoff double in the second and pitched around a second-and-third, one-out situation with a strikeout and flyout.

Duke divvied up the other five innings with a reliever taking each one. Those were Fran Oschell III, who gave up the run in the third without allowing a hit, and then James Tallon, Gabriel Nard, Jimmy Romano and Charlie Beilenson all with scoreless innings.