Duke Baseball: With high goals, Blue Devils ready to start 2019 season

It’s opening day for the Duke Baseball team as the Blue Devils will host Lehigh on Friday afternoon in the first game of a three game series.

One year removed from the most successful team in Duke Baseball history, the Blue Devils will be back on the field on Friday afternoon to start the 2019 season.

It’s Opening Day in Durham as the Blue Devils will welcome the Lehigh Mountain Hawks into the Durham Bulls Athletic Park.

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With many national polls in college baseball, Duke was ranked in the Top-25 in three of the six national polls, while being ranked the highest in the Collegiate Baseball Preseason Poll at No. 20, while No. 22 in the Baseball America Rankings, and No. 25 in the National Baseball Writers Association Preseason Poll.

The Blue Devils were also picked to finish tied for second in the ACC’s Coastal Divison with the Virginia Cavaliers in the yearly Coaches Poll, behind the North Carolina Tar Heels.

Duke is coming off of a season where it reach the 45 win mark, the 18 win mark in the ACC, and advancing its way to the NCAA Super Regional, where the Blue Devils fell one game short of making it to the College World Series.

The Blue Devils took on the role of the gritty underdogs throughout last season, especially in the postseason run and expect to see that from the first game of the season this year.

Head Coach Chris Pollard will turn to Graeme Stinson as his Opening Day starter and he will get the ball for the Blue Devils. The southpaw junior is one of the top ranked MLB prospects coming into this season, as Stinson was named as a unanimous First Team All American by Baseball America and five other preseason All-American selections.

First pitch between the Duke Blue Devils and the Lehigh Mountain Hawks is schedule for 4:00 pm ET on Friday afternoon and the game can be seen on the Watch ESPN App.

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