The third-seeded Longwood baseball team lost 9-3 to seventh-seeded Liberty in the second game of the 2016 Big South Championship quarterfinals Wednesday in Lexington, S.C.

Longwood will look to stave off elimination Thursday at 3 p.m. as it faces second-seeded High Point, which was also knocked off by the Flames in the opening game of the tournament. The winner of Thursday’s contest moves on to the Big South semifinals on Friday.

The Flames used a huge fourth-inning scoring burst and a four-RBI outing from right fielder Will Shepherd on Wednesday to fuel their second victory of the tournament.

Luke Simpson (1-4) took the loss on the mound for the Lancers, as he allowed five earned runs on five hits in 1.2 innings of work. Michael Catlin added 4.1 innings of pitching in relief of Simpson and was one of six pitchers to take the mound for Longwood.
Shortstop Michael Osinski led all Lancers with two RBI, as he went 2-for-5 on the day with both RBI coming on a pair of singles.
Liberty’s Shane Quarterly (6-4) came away with the win after not allowing a run in 3.2 innings of relief pitching.
In the first inning, Longwood squared things up at 1-1 on Osinski’s first RBI single that dropped into right field. C.J. Roth came home from third to score Longwood’s first run of the day after hitting a single on the first pitch of the bottom of the first inning.

The Lancers cut their deficit to 5-3 with three straight singles in the fifth, including a bases-loaded RBI single to right field by Osinski. The hit once again brought home Roth, who led off the inning with a walk, before Alex Lewis and Connar Bastaich followed with singles of their own.

Longwood won its first game of the tournament 8-6 Tuesday against sixth-seeded Winthrop.