TROY, N.Y. – The Ithaca College baseball team will play for its third straight Liberty League championship tomorrow after the Bombers withstood a 13-inning marathon matchup with the University of Rochester on Friday afternoon at RPI and came away with a 3-2 victory in the second-straight walk-off win for the Bombers. Ithaca is now 30-9 on the season and will face the winner of Rochester and Union on Saturday.

The Bombers put together the first scoring chance of the game as Tyler Pugliese and Rothstein recorded back-to-back two-out singles, but a bang-bang play at first on a groundball to short by Riley Brawdy ended the inning.

Rochester utilized that momentum swing to score twice in the top of the third on a bases loaded hit by pitch and walk to take a 2-0 lead. Jack Picozzi settled in after that and retired the next two batters to avoid further damage.

Picozzi would toss 7.0 innings with eight strikeouts in a no-decision as he allowed three hits and four walks.

Ithaca got a run on the board in the bottom of the sixth as Pugliese ripped a double to right-center to score Ethan McDonough, but the tying run was thrown out at the plate to keep it at a 2-1 lead for Rochester.

The Bombers tied the game at 2-2 in the seventh on an RBI double to right by Collin Feeney that plated Rothstein. Now with two runners in scoring position and one out, Brawdy was thrown out at home on a grounder to second base and a strikeout ended the inning.

From there, it was a battle to see who would strike first offensively. Ithaca would be that team in the bottom of the 13th inning as Rothstein doubled off the right-center wall to bring in Colin Dunn for the game-winning run and IC's second straight walk-off win in the tournament. Dunn pinch ran for Pugliese, who led off the inning with a double to right.

Rothstein, who had a tough day at the plate on Thursday, went 5-for-6 today. Pugliese was 3-for-5 with two doubles.

John Griffin entered in relief to begin the eighth inning and would go on to pitch the game of his career as he went 6.0 innings and gave up just three hits and two walks with six strikeouts. Griffin retired the Yellowjackets in order in three innings of his outing and got out of a bases loaded jam in the top of the 13th to improve to 5-0 on the season.

The championship game will begin at 12 p.m. tomorrow. An if necessary game will follow should the Bombers lose in the noon contest.