HARRISONBURG, Va. (Interstat) — Virginia Tech built a five-run lead in the first three innings and its bullpen, led by a dominant outing from Brody Roe, navigated repeated threats from James Madison to secure a 5-4 victory Tuesday in a nonconference baseball game that stretched from afternoon into evening at Eagle Field at Veterans Memorial Park.

The Hokies (7-1) jumped on Dukes starter Parker Bauer immediately. Sam Grube led off the game with a double and scored on Owen Petrich’s triple to left-center. Ethan Ball followed with an RBI single to make it 2-0.

Virginia Tech extended its lead to 5-0 in the third. Nick Locurto led off with a bunt single, advanced on a wild pitch and scored on Ball’s second RBI single. After a stolen base and a walk loaded the bases, Henry Cooke drove in a run with a sacrifice bunt. A pitching change to James Madison’s Tyler Lutz did not stop the damage, as a second run scored on a fielder’s choice.

Lutz settled in brilliantly from there, however, providing the most important performance for the Dukes (3-4). After entering with the bases loaded and one out in the third, he stifled the Hokies’ offense. The reliever fired four innings, allowing just two hits and one earned run while striking out six. His effort kept James Madison within striking distance.

The Dukes began chipping away. They scored on a sacrifice fly by Jason Guerrero in the third and added another run in the fourth on a wild pitch by Hokies starter Ben Weber, who worked three scoreless innings but was charged with two runs after leaving with the bases loaded.

The most critical juncture of the game came in the bottom of the fourth. With the bases loaded and one out, Virginia Tech turned to Roe. The reliever extinguished the threat by getting a lineout and a flyout, then proceeded to dominate. Roe pitched 2 1/3 perfect innings of relief, striking out three. His outing bridged the middle innings and preserved a 5-2 lead after the Hokies had added a solo home run by Preston Daniel in the top of the sixth.

James Madison mounted its strongest challenge in the seventh, closing the gap to 5-4. Pinch-runner Wyatt Haacke scored on an RBI single by Kyle Langley, who later came home on a single by Jason Seguin. The Dukes put the tying run on third and the go-ahead run on second with two outs, but reliever Peyton Smith entered and struck out Kenton Haesler looking to end the inning.

The Dukes threatened again in the eighth and ninth innings, putting the potential tying run in scoring position in both frames. In the ninth, they placed runners on second and third with one out against reliever Brendan Yagesh. Virginia Tech then brought in Smith, who induced a groundout and a game-ending groundout to first baseman Eddie Gibson, who was unassisted, to strand both runners and end the game.

Virginia Tech’s Petrich went 2 for 5 with an RBI, while Ball drove in two runs. The Hokies managed nine hits but struck out 14 times. James Madison out-hit the Hokies 10-9, with Langley, Seguin, Ian Schmidly and Ryan Moody each collecting two hits, but left 11 runners on base.

The win extended Virginia Tech’s strong early-season momentum ahead of a challenging weekend at the Kubota College Baseball Series in Arlington, Texas, where they will face Texas A&M, Mississippi State and Tennessee. James Madison, which saw its two-game win streak snapped, travels to Greenville, South Carolina, for a weekend tournament.

The game’s outcome was tighter than projections by Interstat, whose game simulator had predicted an 8-7 Virginia Tech victory and whose ELO system gave the Hokies a 68.6% probability to win.