Weekend recap: Duke goes 3-1 against Princeton

Duke’s baseball team had a successful weekend, winning three of four games against Princeton. 

The Blue Devils’ pitching staff has been one of the most impressive in the nation thus far and they stayed hot against the Tigers. 

In the four-game series, the Blue Devils allowed just eight runs in their first three games, and allowed eight in their only loss of the weekend on Sunday afternoon. 

Here are quick recaps of each game this weekend:

Duke 6, Princeton 2

On Friday, Blue Devils ace Aidan Weaver (3-0), picked up his third win of the season pretty easily. 

Weaver’s final line was: Seven innings, five hits, two earned runs, nine strikeouts and just one walk. 

Catcher Canon Cider had one of his best games at the plate. He had half of the team’s hits in the win, with two hits, four RBI, one walk and came across the plate for two runs in the Blue Devils victory. 

Marcello Mastroianni shut down the Tigers late as he came in for Weaver in the eighth inning. He finished the game with two innings, allowing one hit and one walk.

Duke 9, Princeton 2

In Saturday’s first game, it was another shutdown performance for the Blue Devils pitchers. They limited the Tigers to just two runs in back-to-back stress free wins. 

Matthew Nochowitz took the mound for Duke and did his thing. His final line was: Six innings, six hits, one earned run, one walk and six strikeouts. It was another stellar performance from a Blue Devils pitcher that’ll be much needed throughout the season. 

Duke totaled eight hits in the game with Cider, Michael DiMartini and Coltin Quagliano each having two a piece. 

Aiden O’Connell picked up his third save of the season, allowing just one run in the late innings on Saturday afternoon. He pitched the final three innings and allowed two hits and one run, with five strikeouts and without a walk.

Duke 14, Princeton 4 (7 innings)

In Saturday’s second game, the Blue Devils picked up a double-digit win. The game ended in the seventh inning because of a 10-run mercy rule. 

Ben Dean (2-0) picked up his second win of the season as he went five innings, giving up three hits and four runs, only one of which was earned. He didn’t allow a walk and had eight strikeouts. 

Cider had another big game as he was the DH. He scored three runs, had three walks and also added three RBI to his season total. The sophomore had a huge weekend. 

Matthew Strand, who started behind the plate for the Blue Devils, had three hits, two RBI and two runs in the win.  

This was another game that Duke didn’t have to go deep into the bullpen as Peter Lemke was the only other pitcher to come in. 

He went two innings, allowing two hits, no runs, one walk and four strikeouts. 

Princeton 8, Duke 7

On Sunday, the only loss of the weekend came in what was a shaky game for the Blue Devils pitchers as the Tigers scored at least one run from the fourth inning to the ninth. 

Duke (11-3) got a solid game from the one- and two-hole hitters, as Jake Lambdin and RJ Hamilton combined for two hits, four runs and three RBI. 

Roman DiGiacomo was credited with the loss for the Blue Devils, as he went just two-thirds of an inning, giving up two runs and one walk.