SCRANTON, Pa. – The top seeded University of Scranton baseball team (28-11-1) brought the tying run to the plate in the bottom of the ninth, but dropped a 10-7 decision to the No. 4 seed Susquehanna River Hawks (16-23) in the opening game of the Landmark Conference Tournament on Friday afternoon at Volpe Field in Scranton.

The Royals will take on No. 2 seed Catholic in an elimination game on Saturday morning at Volpe Field with first pitch set for 11 a.m. The Cardinals were defeated 18-8 by No. 3 seed Elizabethtown on Friday night.

In the bottom of the ninth, Scranton trailed 10-7 as sophomore Corey Zientek (Sugarloaf, Pa./Hazleton Area) stepped to the plate representing the tying run with two outs, but Adam Stuck got the final out to end the game and pick up his second save of the year for the River Hawks.

A couple of innings earlier, Scranton trailed 10-4, but got two back in the seventh and one in the eighth to draw within three runs. Senior Tyler Kirsten (Wallenpaupack, Pa./Wallenpaupack Area) plated a run with an RBI triple in the seventh and later scored on graduate student Kevin Johnson's (Whitehouse Station, N.J./Hunterdon Central) RBI groundout, while fellow senior Jake Lisicky (Whitehall, Pa./Whitehall) knocked in a run with an RBI single in the eighth.

Lisicky's RBI single plated graduate student Connor Harding (Vestal, N.Y./Vestal) who broke the program's single-season runs record and now has 60 on the season. Harding also has 166 runs scored in his career, which is tied for both the program and Landmark Conference all-time record that is currently held by Chris Stallone (2008-11).

The Royals opened the scoring with a sac fly from Kirsten in the first and added consecutive RBI singles from Harding and Zientek in the second to take an early 3-0 lead, but Susquehanna would rally over the next three innings.

A run in the third put the visitors on the board before they took the lead with three in the fourth and five in the fifth as seven Scranton errors in the game proved costly with four coming in the fifth inning that made it a 9-3 game at the time.

Junior right-hander Daniel Johnson (Whitehouse Station, N.J/Immaculata) allowed just one earned run on eight hits and fanned three over 4 1/3 IP, but was dealt the loss for the Royals.

Eight of Susquehanna's 10 runs in the game were unearned.

Dillan Weikel surrendered five runs on six hits to go along with two walks and a strikeout in six plus innings to record the win for the River Hawks.

Harding (2-4, RBI, 2 R), Zientek (2-5, RBI, R) and junior Nick Reposa (Factoryville, Pa./Tunkhannock) who added two hits, an RBI and a stolen bases all registered multi-hit games in the setback for the Royals.

In relief for Scranton, freshman right-hander Dominic Chieffalo (Norristown, Pa./Malvern Prep) fanned two over 2 2/3 shutout IP and junior right-hander Liam Fitzgerald (Pearl River, N.Y./Pearl River) also tossed a scoreless inning with one strikeout.

--ROYALS--