WILSON, NC – The Grand Valley State baseball team split with Kentucky Wesleyan in a doubleheader that began on Friday afternoon and ended early Saturday morning. The Panthers won game one, 7-2, before freshman Jake Rydquist (first career AB) hit a walk-off single in the bottom of the 10^th  of game two to give the Lakers a 7-6 win. GVSU will have a quick turnaround as they are slated to play Cedarville at 10:00 A.M. on Saturday morning.
 
Game 1 – L, 7-2
 
Kentucky Wesleyan jumped out to a 4-0 lead through two innings of play before the Lakers would get one back in the fourth inning to make it 4-1. The Panthers added a run in the fifth and two more runs in the sixth to increase their lead to 7-1. GVSU would threaten in the seventh, but only scored one run on a Ryan Blake-Jones RBI groundout.
 
Freshman Austin Brown (0-1) was tagged with the loss, while Luke Hargis and Nathan Wargolet pitched the final 3.1 innings in relief. Blake-Jones tallied the only extra base-hit for the Lakers, a triple off the centerfield wall and senior Ryan Lorber had a hit and a run scored in the seventh inning after subbing in as a pinch hitter.
 
Game 2 – W, 7-6 (10 inn.)
 
The Panthers scored first once again, but the Lakers quickly answered. In the second inning, freshman Alex McCormack hit an RBI single to score Lorber, Christian Faust hit an RBI triple, and Parker Murdie hit an RBI single to give the Lakers a 3-1 lead. In the fifth, Ryan Blake-Jones launched a two-run homerun and McCormack executed a safety squeeze to increase the GVSU lead to 6-1. However, Kentucky Wesleyan would score three runs in the seventh and two runs in the eight to knot the game at 6-6. After loading the bases in the bottom of the ninth and failing to score, the Lakers had another opportunity in the 10^th inning. Rydquist stepped up to the plate, after pinch-running in the ninth, with runners on first and third and knocked a single through the left side of the infield to give the Lakers the win.
 
Starter Nick Rutkowski did not factor in the decision, but had a quality start by going 6.1 innings while allowing three runs on eight hits and three strikeouts. Closer Michael Barno (1-0) earned the win, tossing three scoreless innings without allowing a hit and striking out six.
 
Anthony Cocco, Lorber, and Murdie each had multi-hit games. McCormack and Blake-Jones each drove in two runs and Jonathan Catapano laid down the sacrifice bunt to put Murdie in position to score the winning run.