AUBURNDALE, Fla. – The Fairleigh Dickinson University Florham baseball team scored four runs in the second inning en route to an 8-6 victory over Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), on Wednesday night at the Lake Myrtle Sports Complex. With the win, the Devils improve to 4-5, while the Engineers drop to 2-5.

FDU-Florham received 5.2 innings from freshman righthander Joseph Kastner (1-0), who allowed five runs (4 earned) on nine hits. He struck out four and walked one. Junior Kevin Brown worked the final 3.1 frames to earn the saves.

RPI opened the scoring with a two-run bottom of the first inning. Sophomore Noah Normyle singled with the bases loaded to score junior Austin Lawrence, in front of an RBI-infield single off the bat of senior captain JT Sawyer.

The Devils posted a four-run top of the second, thanks to three hits and one Engineers' error. Kevin Smiegocki laced a single to center, scoring Christopher Franco, before David Wilbur tied the game at 2-2 with a sacrifice fly to center. An error and a wild pitch provided the third and fourth runs of the inning.

Florham took a 6-2 lead in the top of the fourth, as Joseph Bonaccorso grounded into a would-be double play, but an errant relay allowed a second run to score.

Senior Weston Hawkins reached on an infield single in the bottom of the inning, which brought Sawyer in from third after he was hit by a pitch earlier in the inning.

Reynaldo Diaz then came up with a big two-out, two-run double to the gap in left center to extend the visitors' lead to 8-3 in the top of the sixth.

The Engineers answered once again, as pinch hitter Michael Arboleda delivered a two-run double of his own in the bottom half, scoring Jimmy Jankowski and DJ Marone. A Marone sac fly in the seventh brought RPI within 8-6, but they did climb any closer, as a ninth inning double play snuffed out a potential rally.

Four RPI hurlers took to hill, including freshman Jake Nichols, who worked a 1-2-3 first inning, before running into trouble in the second. He finished with four runs allowed (2 earned) on three hits over 1.2 innings. He struck out one and walked two. Classmate and fellow lefty had the best outing of the day on both sides, working a perfect final 3.2 innings with four strikeouts.

The Engineers are back in action on Thursday night, when they face Iowa Wesleyan at Lake Myrtle Sports Complex (5:30pm). Fairleigh Dickinson takes on Olivet College on Thursday (9am).