BRIDGEWATER, Va. - Messiah baseball could not take advantage of four Bridgewater College errors on Tuesday afternoon, as the Falcon offense was held in check in a 3-1 loss to the Eagles.

Bridgewater got on the board first against Messiah starter Quinton Kuntz with a Chris King RBI double in the bottom of the first inning. After that inning, neither team was able to push a run across the plate until the fifth, when the Falcons evened the score after Austin Mellinger led off with a single and eventually came around to score from third on a Jimmy Kustra suicide squeeze. However, the Eagles responded right away in the bottom of the inning off of Ethan Hess with a solo shot to right from Austin Batten and another RBI double from King to take a 3-1 lead that would hold for the remainder of the game.

Nick Godwin led Messiah from the plate with two of the Falcons' six hits on the afternoon. Despite getting the leadoff batter on base in five of the nine innings, Messiah was 0-8 with runners in scoring position and 0-13 with runners on base. Only two Falcon baserunners reach second base before the fifth inning, and then after scoring the run in the top of that frame, had just two batters reach base in the sixth and seventh, both of whom were picked off of first by Jacob Benfield.

After a 1-2-3 top of the eighth, Messiah hinted at a comeback in the ninth as Colin Fry led off the inning with a single followed by Godwin reaching on an error to put runners on first and second with no outs. Dan Wiederrecht advanced Fry to third with a flyout to right field, and after pinch-running for Godwin, JJ Robinson stole second to give Trey Pritchard a chance to tie the game with a base hit. However, the Falcons were unable to push across either of the men in scoring position, as Pritchard struck out swinging and pinch-hitter Ben Wilson flied out to right field to end the game.

After giving up the run in the bottom of the first, Kuntz struggled again in the second inning as the Eagles were able to load the bases with only out. However, Kuntz settled down and struck out the next two batters to end the threat and the inning. In the top of the third, he mowed down two more Bridgewater batters to bring his strikeout total to six through three innings before being replaced by Hess. 

Hess executed a perfect 1-2-3 top of the fourth but ran into the aforementioned trouble in the fifth, giving up a pair of runs to get saddled with the loss. Matt Wright replaced Hess with two outs in the bottom of the sixth and was able to retire the only batter he faced. Jordan Nichols was on the mound to start the eighth, and pitched very well in relief, throwing a scoreless final two innings with a pair of strikeouts.

The Falcons move to 1-1 on the season, and will next travel to the University of Mary Washington on Saturday for a doubleheader starting at 1:00 p.m.