Purchase, NY (May 3, 2017) – The Purchase baseball team dropped a 7-6 decision to non-conference foe Manhattanville College Wednesday afternoon.

Freshman Matt Lynch brought home junior Nick Campana in the ninth inning to give the Valiants the victory.

Purchase broke open scoring action with three runs in the second inning but a RBI double by freshman Joseph Silvestri in the bottom of the second cut into the Panther lead, making it a 3-1 game through the opening two frames.

After two scoreless frames, the Panthers added two runs in the fifth off a Brian Cunningham (SO/Westbury, NY) 2-RBI double to extend the lead to four runs until Manhattanville added a RBI single in the bottom half of the inning to make it 5-2.

Senior Ronald Pressley (Bronx, NY) batted in the final run for Purchase in the top of the sixth, before the Valiant rally in the bottom half of the inning.
 
Paced by Jonathan Lattarulo's triple and a wild pitch by the Panthers, Manhattanville added three runs to even the scoring at 6-6 through six innings.

The Panthers and Valiants went scoreless in the next two frames, but Purchase threatened in the ninth, putting runners at first and second before Billy Tempone retired three straight to get out of the inning.

In their final at bat, the Valiants led off with a Campana single and put two men on with a bunt single by junior Danny Gallagher. A sacrifice bunt put the winning run on third base and an intentional walk to load the bases set up Lynch for his second walk-off effort of the season. The freshman grounded a ball between first and second base and Campana beat the throw home for the winning run to help the Valiants come away with the 7-6 victory.

Campana and freshman Peter Iannarilli recorded two hits each in the win, with Campana scoring two runs on the day. Lattarulo recorded his first career hit with a two-RBI triple in the sixth inning.

On the mound, junior Tempone earned his first win of the season after throwing a scoreless ninth inning in relief.  Freshman Danny Meduri added 2.2 innings of relief in his first appearance of the season striking out two in his collegiate debut. Junior John Fanelli worked out of a jam in the fifth inning by recording two outs and freshman Mike Rothman tossed three innings, allowing one hit and one run.

The Panthers are set to close the 2017 season with a non-conference home game against New York University tomorrow at 4 p.m.