WASHINGTON, Pa. – The Washington & Jefferson College baseball team (27-13, 17-4) opened the 2025 Presidents Athletic Conference Tournament with a commanding 7-1 victory over No. 6 seeded Thiel Tomcats (14-26, 10-10) Wednesday morning in Game A of the tournament at Ross Memorial Park.

Jacob LaDuca (Clarence, N.Y./Canisius), Knox Meier (Tampa, Fla./Berkeley Prep) and Brian Feldman (Gibsonia, Pa./Eden Christian Academy) each had two hits on the day to lead the Presidents. Meier registered the only extra base hit for the Red & Black placing a double into the right centerfield gap. Feldman knocked in a team-high two runs.
 
After three scoreless innings, W&J broke through in the bottom of the fourth inning. Consecutive singles by Meier and Feldman put a pair of runners on base. Stern helped W&J get on the board with an RBI single to score Meier. Two batters later, Brody Bartenstein (Corning, N.Y./Corning-Painted Post) knocked in W&J's second run with an RBI single to score Feldman. The Presidents tacked on a third run when they executed a double steal, allowing Stern to score, 3-0.
 
W&J scored two more runs in the fifth inning. Feldman knocked a two RBI single back up the middle to stretch the Presidents lead to 5-0 heading into the sixth inning.
 
The Presidents took advantage of two errors to tack on two insurance runs in the seventh inning. Thiel loaded the bases in the eighth and pushed across its first and only run of the game.
 
DiMatteo tossed seven shutout innings to guide the Presidents to the victory. DiMatteo struck out seven and walked just one batter. The seven strikeouts move DiMatteo past Tyler Horvat '23 into the second slot of the W&J all-time career strikeout list with 213. DiMatteo improves his record to 9-0 on the mound this season. He lowers his Division III leading earned-run average to 0.83 this season.
 
Ben Pierce (Bel Air, Md./John Carroll) worked the eighth inning on the mound. Brandon Bastian (Barto, Pa./The Hill School) tossed a perfect ninth to close out the victory.
 
W&J advances to face the loser of Game C, between third-seeded Allegheny and fourth-seeded Westminster, which will take place on Wednesday evening. The Presidents will face that opponent on Thursday (May 8) at 2:30 p.m.