WASHINGTON, Pa. – The Thiel College baseball team opened the 2017 Presidents' Athletic Conference (PAC) Baseball Championship Tournament with a 9-8 loss in extra innings to top-seeded Washington and Jefferson College.
 
The Tomcats led 1-0 after one inning after  Zach Hudecek (Gibsonia, Pa./Deer Lakes) hit a sacrifice fly to center field to score Alex Lam (Springboro, Ohio/Springboro).

Thiel continued to add to its early lead when Nick Fowkes (New Eagle, Pa./Ringgold) led the second inning off with a triple to center field and later scored on a double steal.
 
The Presidents answered in the bottom of the inning with the bases full and two outs. Derek Helbing plated two runs to tie the game at 2-2 before Nick Vento singled to take the lead for the Presidents. W&J led 3-2 after two.
 
Daniel Patrice (Munich, Germany/EST) and Hudecek each drove in runs in both the third and the fourth innings to regain the lead for the Tomcats. Hudecek went 3-for-4 on the day with a team-high three RBIs. The Tomcats led 6-4 after four innnings.
 
In the seventh, Starter Nick Bucci (Pittsburgh, Pa./Allderdice) was relieved by Michael Rohm (Lisbon, Ohio/David Anderson). Bucci went 6.2 innings, allowed six earned runs on nine hits and struck out four to keep the strongest offense in the PAC in check.
 
The Presidents scored two runs to take the lead 8-7 in the seventh before Bryan Mitchell (Cleveland, Ohio/Padua Franciscan) collected his fifth hit of the day on a home run to left field to tie the game.
 
Both teams went scoreless in the ninth to force extra innings. W&J walked off on a Dante Dalesandro fielder's choice to second base that plate the winning run.
 
Fourth-seeded Thiel will take on second-seeded Thomas More Friday at 3 p.m. in the tournament's first elimination game. The winner of the Thiel-Thomas More game will meet the loser between W&J-Grove City at 6 p.m.

The conference's four-team, double-elimination championship tournament is being held at Ross Memorial Park in Washington, Pa.