BOONE, N.C. – App State will travel to Durham, N.C. on Tuesday, as they face off with the Duke Blue Devils at 4 p.m. at Durham Bulls Athletic Park. The contest will be televised on the ACC Network Extra.
SCOUTING THE MOUNTAINEERS
App State is 8-2 on the season after a rollercoaster weekend against Gardner-Webb. App State won game one of the two-game series, 12-11, on Saturday, thanks to a walk-off double from
Hayden Cross. The lead changed hands multiple times in the late innings, as
Dylan Rogers hit a go-ahead home run in the seventh, and
Luke Drumheller hit a go-ahead home run in the eighth.
Jackson Steensma earned his first career win in relief. Sunday the Mountaineers fell 19-6. App State began the season winning their first seven games, including weekend sweeps of Queens and North Carolina A&T, as well as a mid-week win over High Point.
Hayden Cross leads the Mountaineers offensively with 20 hits and 15 RBIs in the first ten games of the season. On the Mound, the Mountaineers are unbeaten with
Xander Hamilton starting. He is 2-0 with a 3.94 ERA and 19 strikeouts and 16 innings this season.
Trey Tujetsch will start on Tuesday for the Mountaineers. He suffered at tough-luck loss last Tuesday at ETSU, allowing just one run in five innings.
SCOUTING THE BLUE DEVILS
The Blue Devils are 8-3 this season, taking two of three games from Princeton at home over the weekend. After falling 7-3 on Friday, Duke bounced back with a dominant 21-2 win on Saturday, before winning the finale, 12-5. The Blue Devils also scored 20-plus runs twice against Baylor, and rank fourth in the nation averaging 11.5 runs per game. The Blue Devils also blanked No. 9 ECU last Tuesday. Jay Beshears leads the Blue Devils at the plate, batting .348 with five doubles, two home runs and 20 RBIs in 11 games. The Blue Devils' pitching staff has also worked to an ERA of just 2.61 this season, with five pitchers making multiple outings without allowing a run. Alex Gow will start against the Mountaineers. He tossed four scoreless innings, striking out two last week against ECU.
SERIES HISTORY
The Mountaineers and Blue Devils will meet for the tenth time in program history. Duke leads the all-time series, 6-3, including an 8-5 win last season. App State led 4-1 after four innings, helped by a first inning homer from
Dylan Rogers, but the Blue Devils scored seven of the final eight runs in the contest.
Cameron Kepley started that game for the Mountaineers in his first action after missing two seasons with injury.
COACHING CONNECTION
Duke Head Coach Chris Pollard has significant ties to the App State program. Pollard was the Head Coach of the Mountaineers from 2005 through 2012, culminating with a school-record 41 wins in his final campaign, leading the Mountaineers to a SoCon Championship and the final round of the Charlottesville regional with postseason wins over Virginia and Oklahoma. Not only did Pollard lead the Mountaineers, he was also
Kermit Smith's Head Coach at Pfeiffer University in 2000, in the App State Head Coach's senior season.
CLUTCH CROSS
Fifth-year senior catcher
Hayden Cross has enjoyed a sensational start to his 2023 campaign, highlighted by a walk-off two-run double on Saturday against Gardner-Webb. Cross hit safely in the first nine games of the season, going 20-41 (.488) over that span with six doubles and 15 RBIs, before going hitless on Sunday. Cross ranks second in the conference in hits (20), tied for second in doubles (6), third in batting (.455), and 10
th in RBIs (15). Cross was named a second team All-Conference catcher last season, slashing .305/.399/.429 with 16 doubles and 33 RBI in 49 games. Cross finished the campaign with 15 multi-hit games, compared to 14 hitless games, while throwing out 37% of base stealers to rank third in the Sun Belt.
STRONG START
- App State won its first seven games of the season, the best start for the Mountaineers since winning their first 10 games of 2010 (under Chris Pollard)
- App State was among the final 12 unbeaten teams in all of college baseball this season
- App State's opening-weekend sweep of Queens was their first sweep since March 19-21, 2021 against Arkansas State and their first non-conference sweep since 2020 against Charleston Southern
- App State's seven game winning streak to begin the year was their longest since they won seven straight in 2012…they also had a separate 12-game winning streak that year
- App State has posted two sweeps this season their most in a year since posting five sweeps in 2012
UP NEXT:
App State will welcome the 24
th ranked Campbell Camels to Smith Stadium for a three-game series. Friday and Saturday's games will begin at 3 p.m. with the finale set for 1 p.m. on Sunday. All three games will be broadcast on ESPN+. Campbell is 8-2 on the season after winning two of three from Sun Belt member Louisiana. The Camels also posted an extra-inning win over No. 11 ECU two weeks ago. They will face Tulane in a two-game mid-week set Tuesday and Wednesday. The Mountaineers took two of three from the Camels in Buies Creek last year to open the season.
