DURHAM – You don’t need AJ Gracia in the lineup when his replacement is scorching hot.

So hot that Kyle Johnson needed water after hitting an RBI double in the sixth inning.

Johnson powered Duke to a 7-4 victory against Murray State in the first game of a super regional series Saturday afternoon at Jack Coombs Field.

The Blue Devils (41-19) are a win away from their first trip to the Men’s College World Series in 64 years after Johnson went 4-for-4 with Duke’s first five RBI.

Johnson was in the game, batting ninth and playing centerfield, in place of sophomore AJ Gracia. Johnson entered hitting .167 this season; he’s now hitting .228.

His two-run home run in the bottom of the third inning tied the game at 2-2 and breathed life into this crowd of 2,686 — the largest in program history (for Duke’s on-campus stadium).

Johnson’s ground-rule double with the bases loaded an inning later gave the Blue Devils the lead, and then that double in the sixth provided an insurance run.

Johnson singled in the eighth to cap his 4-for-4 day; Duke pulled him for a pinch-runner, which seems to be the clearest indication that the two-way player will start tomorrow’s Game 2 of the series.

Murray State scored a run in each the second and third innings to grab a 2-0 lead. The first one came after two singles to start the inning and scored on a sacrifice fly by Dan Tauken; the second scored on a two-out single by Dom Decker.

Those were the only two runs against starter Owen Proksch, though. Duke’s top starter went 5 2/3, allowing six hits, two walks and a hit batter, to go with seven strikeouts. He threw 115 pitches and exited after a two-out walk.

Mark Hindy entered and got a groundout on the second pitch he threw, protecting what was a three-run lead at the time.

The first three batters of the seventh reached against Hindy. That brought on Reid Easterly, who gave up an RBI single.

But the next two outs — the first of them, a sacrifice fly that made it 7-4 — were running grabs in centerfield by Johnson (who else?).

Easterly allowed one runner, a leadoff single in the ninth, which was erased by a 5-4-3 double play.

Duke was without centerfielder Gracia because of his ejection in last weekend’s regional-clinching win against Oklahoma State. But the Blue Devils got third baseman Ben Miller back in the lineup after he missed that win against the Cowboys; he was hit by a pitch in the previous game against Georgia on his right wrist/forearm area.