PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Castleton's men's baseball team rallied with two runs in the final inning of play, but its comeback fell short, as Johnson & Wales secured a 4-3 victory on Friday afternoon at the Scotts Miracle-Gro Athletic Complex.

The Spartans struggled in the field with three errors while also being limited to just five total hits. With the loss, Castleton now stands at 9-6 on the season whereas the Wildcats climb back to .500 at 6-6 overall. Game two of the doubleheader was called off after two innings of play due to rain.

Sam Spencer turned in another solid outing for the Spartans with five strikeouts and just one earned run in six innings pitched. His counterpart, Brandon Rainville, was just as good by tossing five innings of one-run baseball to pick up his first win of the season.

Tyler Lord paced the Castleton lineup after finishing 3-for-4 with a double and one run scored, while Dan Errico went 1-for-2 with a pair of RBIs. Ivan Reyes and Ryan Cabral, meanwhile, led the Johnson & Wales attack by producing a collective three hits with two RBIs and one run scored.

The Wildcats got off to a quick start with a pair of runs in the first inning to capture a 2-0 lead. Back-to-back runners reached base due to error to start the frame before the Spartans recorded a pair of outs.

After a batter was hit to load the bases, Reyes stepped up, and with two outs, the sophomore singled through the left side of the infield to plate a pair of runs and hand the hosts an early two-run advantage.

Johnson & Wales continued to press in the following inning when Lou Umberto led off with a double to left. A sacrifice bunt from Rob Bochetti moved Umberto third before Spencer struck out Kory Ferullo. It seemed that the away side would get out of the jam, but with one on and two out, Jordan Pilarski's grounder was mishandled, allowing Umberto to score and extend the Wildcats lead to three.

Castleton finally got on the scoreboard in the top of the fifth inning when Errico recorded his first RBI of the game. Soren Pelz-Walsh started off the frame with a walk, and two batters later, Lord doubled to left field to put two runners in scoring position. Nick Swim was hit by a pitch to load the bases, and in the next at-bat, Errico reached base in the same way, plating Pelz-Walsh and cutting the visitors deficit back to two.   

In the bottom of the sixth, the hosts responded to push their lead back to three. Cabral walked to start the inning before advancing to second on a sacrifice bunt attempt. Umberto followed with an RBI single that plated Cabral to make it 4-1 in favor of the hosts.

With just three outs remaining in the game, the Spartan attack finally got going in the top of the seventh. Lord and Swim began the frame with back-to-back hits before Errico drove the ball to left field to bring home Lord. Tyler Hoare then followed with a sacrifice bunt to put runners on second and third with one out. Jimmy Buckley's sacrifice fly scored Swim and cut Castleton's deficit to one, but it wasn't enough, as the Wildcats recorded the third out in the next at-bat to secure a 4-3 victory.

The Spartans return to action next Tuesday when they host New England College for a doubleheader starting at 2 pm before facing the Pilgrims again the following day for another two-game set.