TALLAHASSEE, Fla, - Niagara senior Drew Fittry had a no-hitter that lasted through 5.1 innings before the No. 5 Florida State Seminoles were able to scratch across a few runs as the Purple Eagles fell 4-1 on Saturday afternoon.
 
Fittry, who made his first start since March 7, 2013 in an injury-shortened season, retired 15 of the first 18 batters he faced. The righty picked up steam in the fourth and fifth innings when he retired six-straight batters.
 
"The guys competed well today," said head coach Rob McCoy. "Drew had a great outing. He was locating well and kept a very good team hitless through five innings."
 
Niagara (0-2) almost broke the scoreless tie in its half of the sixth. Pavel Chavez-Rusova led off with a double and advanced to third on a sacrifice bunt, but was stranded 90 feet away home plate as a flyout and a groundout ended the inning. Florida State (2-0) broke the tie in the bottom half of the inning with a RBI-single that ended Fittry's night. The Tonawanda, N.Y. native finished with two earned runs on just the one hit and three walks through 5.1 innings.
 
Florida State added another run in the sixth with a double and one in the seventh on a sacrifice fly to take a 3-0 lead into the eighth inning. Taylor Hackett led off the top-half of the eighth with a walk and advanced to third on a double by Jordan Schwartz.  Chavez-Rusova ended the shutout with a single to third and forced the Seminoles to go the bullpen with the lead down to 3-1. With the go-ahead run at the plate and runners on first and second, NU was unable to convert and Florida State added one more run in the eighth before a scoreless ninth gave them the 4-1 win.
 
"Other than a couple miscues on defense and on the bases, it was a fairly clean game," McCoy said. "Our goal is to get better and do the little things right all the time."
 
Chavez-Rusova finished the afternoon 2-for-3 at the plate with a double and the RBI in the eighth. Thomas Rodrigues also added a pair of hits in his four at-bats. The trio of Cody Eckerson, Ben Zaccagnino, and Jacob Lysiak  came out of the bullpen for NU to combine for one earned run on two hits and two strikeouts in 2.2 innings of work.
 
Niagara and Florida State meet again tomorrow for the third and final game of the series at 11:30 am.