WEST LAWN, PA – The Manhattanville College baseball team fell to the DeSales University Bulldogs in a back-and-forth elimination game in the 2019 Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC) Freedom Baseball Championships Saturday May 4 from Owls Field by a final score of 9-6.

Senior Luke Scoggins (Merrick, N.Y./Sanford H. Calhoun) had two hits and an RBI for Manhattanville (24-18). Junior Matt Lynch (Wappingers Falls, N.Y./Roy C. Ketcham) had two hits, two RBI's and a run scored, fellow junior Luke Tebolt (Wappingers Falls, N.Y./Roy C. Ketcham) had a hit and two runs, and both sophomore Jack Matero (Hopewell Junction, N.Y./John Jay) and freshman Anthony Quatrochi (Fishkill, N.Y./Our Lady of Lourdes) finished with a hit and a run apiece.

For DeSales (23-18), Preston Amato had three hits and three runs, Alex Condello had a two-run homer and Charlie Barebo had three RBI's.

As they had done 24 hours earlier, the Bulldogs put the first two batters of the game on in the top of the first, with each eventually driven in on a sacrifice fly; they added a run in the third via yet another sacrifice fly.

The Valiants offense went to work in the third. After sophomore Hathaway Roper (Stratford, Conn./Bunnell) led off with a walk, Tebolt doubled him to third; Lynch followed with a two-run double to right-center. After Matero reached on an infield single and Quatrochi walked to load the bases, Scoggins tied the game with a sacrifice fly to right field. Junior Joe Silvestri then put Manhattanville in the lead with a line drive single to left field, knocking DeSales starter Ian Kacergis out of the game.

The Valiants defense went to work in both the fourth and fifth. The Bulldogs loaded the bases with nobody out in the fourth, but Viscusi escaped trouble inducing a fly out to left and a 5-4-3 double play, much to the delight of the Manhattanville dugout and faithful. The spectacular defense continued in the fifth when Tebolt went to the base of the wall in left to make a sprawling catch on a ball with extra-base hit written all over it for the first out of the inning. After a strikeout, Scoggins made a diving catch in center field, taking away another extra-base hit from DeSales.

DeSales tied the game with Condello's homer in the sixth, but Quatrochi put Manhattanville back up 6-5 with a single in the bottom half of the inning. The back-and-forth affair continued in the top of the seventh, with the Bulldogs re-taking the lead on a two-run single up the middle.

DeSales added two more runs in the top of the eighth, while Austin Kroeger and Felix Martinez Jr. kept the Valiants off the board over the final four innings.