MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. – Sophomore left-hander Jerry Vasto (Atlantic Highlands, N.J.) allowed three hits in five scoreless innings and combined with three relievers on a six-hitter as the Felician College baseball team defeated nationally-ranked Mercyhurst College, 4-2, on Thursday afternoon at the Ripken Experience complex. Later on Thursday, Felician was defeated by another nationally-ranked squad, Franklin Pierce University, 2-1.

The games began a scheduled four-day, five-game stay for the Golden Falcons at the Northeast Challenge event. Mercyhurst is ranked No. 16, and Franklin Pierce No. 9, in the most recent national NCAA Division II writers' poll.

Against the Lakers, Felician senior third- baseman Mike Farrell (Red Bank, N.J.) broke a scoreless tie in the bottom of the fourth inning with a one-out, two-run double. Gabriel Fellin (Temple, Pa.) picked up a run-scoring single in the fifth, and Aaron Brill (West Palm Beach, Fla.) gave the Golden Falcons a 4-0 edge with an RBI single in the seventh.

Felician (3-3), meanwhile, survived 11 walks and two hit batsmen issued by its pitching staff, as Mercyhurst stranded 14 runners. Vasto (1-0) struck out three batters and walked seven. Reliever Jack Fowler (Shrewsbury, N.J.) fanned three in 2 2/3 innings of relief, but ran into trouble in the top of the ninth.

With one out, Mercyhurst strung together a walk, two singles and a sacrifice fly off of Fowler. The Golden Falcons called on freshman righty John Holland (Jackson, N.J.), who worked around a walk to record the final out for his second save.

In Felician's night game on Thursday, Franklin Pierce was playing its season opener, and the Golden Falcons ran into its ace right-hander, Ryan Thompson (Calgary, Alberta). Thompson, an All-American in 2011, limited Felician to three hits over eight innings with two walks and 14 strikeouts.

Felician received a solid effort from its own starter, junior righty Stephen Paladino (Staten Island, N.Y.) (0-1), who gave up seven hits and three walks in six frames. With three strikeouts, Paladino ran his career total to 153, passing Danny Conti (2007-10) for second place on Felician's all-time list. Scott Van Es (2005-08) is the College's all-time leader with 210.

But the two runs the Ravens scratched across against Paladino turned out to be enough for Thompson. In the top of the third inning, FPU center fielder Calvin Graves (Boston, Mass.) scored from second-base on a two-out Paladino wild pitch, as the ball kicked to the side of the catcher, who could not locate it. Two stanzas later, Graves' squeeze bunt scored pinch-runner Ryan Boswell (New Bedford, Mass.) with the eventual winning run.

In the bottom of the seventh, Farrell drew a leadoff walk off of Thompson and Scott DeJong (North Haledon, N.J.) followed with an RBI triple. But Thompson struck out the next two hitters and then induced an infield pop-up to emerge with the lead.

The Golden Falcons earned a pair of one-out walks off of Raven reliever Vladimir Camacho (Jamaica Plain, Mass.) in the ninth. Camacho then settled down to record a strikeout and a fielder's choice grounder to earn the save.

DeJong was 2 for 3 and Brill had the other hit for Felician. Freshman Dean Loucka (Wood-Ridge, N.J.) pitched three hitless innings of relief. FPU's Graves and Zach Mathieu (Derry, N.H.) had two hits apiece.