RICHMOND, Va. – VCU won its second Atlantic 10 Championship title Saturday, edging Dayton 7-6 at The Diamond.
 
The top-seeded Rams (37-14) have won a school record and best in the nation 21 straight games and earn the Atlantic 10's automatic bid to the NCAA Regionals.
 
VCU held off a late rally from second-seeded Dayton (24-27), with the Flyers scoring single runs in the fifth (Mariano Ricciardi fielder's choice) and seventh innings (Mitchell Garrity sac fly) to close within one, and threatened to score more in the seventh and eighth.  
 
Steven Carpenter went 4-for-6 with two RBI to lead VCU at the plate and earned All-Championship honors for his efforts. Hunter Vay, who was quiet in Saturday's Championship game, but had three home runs and nine RBI through three games, was named the Championship's Most Outstanding Player.
 
Dayton jumped out to an early lead with a Mariano Ricciardi run in the bottom of the first on a Riley Tirotta single. Ricciardi had his own RBI single in the second that scored Eddie Pursinger, and Benjamin Blackwell's sac fly scored Jay Curtis.
 
Spurred by the early runs and the late rally, the Flyers totaled a game-high 11 hits, led by three from All-Championship selection Riley Tirotta (3-for-4) and two each from Ricciardi, Alex Brickman and Pursinger.
 
VCU got a run back in the top of the third, thanks to a centerfield single by Tyler Locklear that plated Hogan Brown. Then, the Rams turned in a huge fourth inning, tallying five runs on two groundouts by Hogan Brown and Liam Hibbits, a Carpenter single and two wild pitches. Carpenter added what would prove to be the winning run in the top of the fifth on a single that scored Connor Hujsak.
 
The game, which featured 11 different pitchers, was delayed four and a half prior to the start due to heavy rains. A second rainstorm moved through during the seventh inning, but play continued.
 
Jack Masloff (2-0) earned the win for 1.1 innings of work with one hit, one run and three strikeouts. Evan Chenier picked up his sixth save of the year for closing out the final 2.1 innings with two hits, no runs and three strikeouts. Hunter Wolfe (4-6) took the loss, allowing one hit and two runs.
 
Joining Vay, Carpenter and Tirotta on the All-Championship Team were Andrew Cossetti from Saint Joseph's, Ryan Twitchell, Mike Webb and Sonny Ulliana of Rhode Island, R.J. Wagner and Ricciardi from Dayton, and Bradford Webb, Jack Schroeder and Locklear from VCU.