JOHNSTOWN, Pa. – The Shippensburg University baseball team went toe-to-toe with No. 21 Mercyhurst in a spirited affair at the 2018 Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) Baseball Championships that began after 10:30 p.m. Wednesday and lasted until 2:15 a.m. Thursday, with the Lakers defeating the Raiders 5-4 on a walk-off single in the bottom of the ninth inning.
 
Shippensburg (26-23) moves to the elimination bracket of the PSAC Tournament and will face Gannon at 12:30 p.m. Thursday, less than 10 hours after arriving back at its hotel after the game. Mercyhurst (32-11) will face Millersville at 6:30 p.m. Thursday.
 
Redshirt-sophomore Zack Sims and junior Michael Hope combined to pitch the entire game for the Raiders. Sims weathered some early struggles to pitch into the seventh inning. He allowed four runs (three earned) on eight hits in his six innings of work, striking out eight. Hope scattered a run on four hits, striking out four in 2.1 innings.
 
SU fell behind 2-0 after the first and 3-0 after four innings, but got back in the game in the late innings after outlasting Mercyhurst starter Chris Vallimont – the nation's leader in strikeouts per nine innings (16.95). Sophomore Jacob Pollock singled in the fifth to end Vallimont's no-hit bid; the Raiders also walked twice in the inning, but could not plate a run.
 
In the sixth, a leadoff walk by senior Nick Spangler and a cue-shot double by senior Dalton Hoiles prefaced a one-out, two-run bloop single by senior catcher Drew Bene that got the Raiders within 4-2. Vallimont left the game after completing six innings, yielding eight base-runners but striking out 11.
 
Shippensburg tied it at 4-4 in the seventh, first scoring a run on a sacrifice fly by junior Cash Gladfelter before Hoiles nabbed his second double on a ball that got lost in the lights by Mercyhurst and landed in fair territory behind the third-base bag.
 
The bottom of the seventh featured a pivotal performance by Hope, who entered out of the bullpen inheriting a bases-loaded situation with no outs. Hope proceeded to strike out the first two batters he faced and then induced a groundout to get the Raiders out of a major jam and keep the score 4-4 entering the eighth.
 
SU got a runner into scoring position with one out in the eighth, and put its first two baserunners on in the ninth, but could not scratch across a run in either case. In the bottom of the ninth, a one-out double and a walk led up to a seeing-eye single through the right side that plated the game's final run for the Lakers.
 
Pollock finished 3-for-4 with a double; he and junior Jack Goertzen were the only Raiders to not strikeout on the day. Hoiles, with his two doubles, is now one shy of the SU single-season record of 22 set back in 1991 by Bill Dobrolsky. He now has 148 RBIs – eight shy of Matt DeSanto's SU career record (156; 2000-03).