NCAA Baseball Morgantown Regional Primer: Duke Blue Devils

For the first time since 1955, postseason baseball is coming back to Morgantown. Ranked fifteenth overall by the NCAA, the Mountaineers will be hosting the NCAA Morgantown Regional this Friday through Monday at Monongalia County Ballpark. Over the next few days, DubVNation will be providing you with previews of the teams WVU will be squaring off with this weekend.

Today, we will be covering the team that received the third seed in the Morgantown Regional, the Duke Blue Devils. Duke heads into postseason play at 31-25 with a final ACC conference record of 15-15 which was good enough for fourth place in the ACC Coastal division. The played two similar opponents to WVU, winning a single game against the Texas Tech Red Raiders and also sweeping their conference series with Pitt.

The Blue Devils come in with the best offense of the teams, holding a team batting average of .271. Their top hitter is senior centerfielder Kennie Taylor who finished the season with a batting average of .333 along with 6 home runs and 39 runs batted in. Another important member of their lineup is sophomore catcher Michael Rothenburg who led the team in both home. runs (10) and RBI’s (49).

Duke’s pitching staff has seen some struggles this year, mainly as a result of injury. Coming into the year, Graeme Stinson was expected to contend for a first round selection but only made five starts before taking a two month absence and eventually being shut down for the season. That left graduate transfer Ben Gross as the top starter, finishing the year with a 4.41 ERA and a 6-4 record. They struggled to find consistency from their starters but found some consistency with sophomore reliever Thomas Girard who clocked a 1.44 ERA in 25 appearances.

A historic program like Duke is always dangerous in a tournament situation like this weekend’s regional. The Mountaineers will definitely see a challenge if they cross paths with the Blue Devils at Monongalia County Ballpark.