FORT MYERS, Fla. – The Franklin & Marshall baseball team (2-9) fell in its non-conference game against Babson (3-5), 18-8, Tuesday morning at the Gene Cusic Collegiate Classic. Errors plagued the Diplomats throughout the game, but three errors leading to six runs in the second inning put the Beavers ahead early in the contest.

Trailing by six in the bottom of the second, F&M got its first two batters on base as AJ Desautels and Andrew Filippelli roped back-to-back singles. Two batters later, Matt Hollender brought both base runners home on a double down the left field line to cut the Babson lead to 6-2. Michael von Zuben followed with a single into right center field, plating Hollender for the Diplomats' third run of the game. After von Zuben swiped second on a steal, Spencer Berson brought him home on a single through the left side of the infield to make it a 6-4 ballgame.

After the Beavers added two runs in the top of the third, F&M responded with a pair of their own in the bottom half of the inning. After Jakob Hoffman led off the inning by getting hit by a pitch, Desautels doubled to put both runners in scoring position with no outs. The next batter, Filippelli shot a deep fly ball to left to score Hoffman on a sacrifice fly to make the score 8-5. A bloop single into right center field by Ryan Rodriguez allowed Desautels to score from second to reduce Babson's lead to 8-6.

Babson scored six more runs across the next three innings to jump out to a 14-6 advantage going into the bottom of the sixth. Starting the inning, Rodriguez and von Zuben reached base on back-to-back singles. After a walk to Berson loaded the bases, Bobby Falese put the ball in play on a groundout to third – bringing home Rodriguez on the play. A balk allowed von Zuben to score on the following at-bat to make the score 14-8, but the Diplomats couldn't manage to add any more runs after that point as Babson won in eight innings via run-rule.

Von Zuben led F&M with three hits, while Desautels and Rodriguez each recorded two in the game.

In his first collegiate start, Will O'Connor (0-1) was deemed the losing pitcher in the contest – allowing one earned run in two innings on the mound.

The Diplomats receive an off day on Wednesday before returning to action on Thursday to face Skidmore at noon.