NORWICH, Conn. — Ticket punched!

The top-seeded LIU baseball team defeated second-seeded Bryant, 7-0, in the winner-take-all nightcap on Sunday at Dodd Stadium to earn the Northeast Conference's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

LIU is headed to the second NCAA Tournament in Dan Pirillo's six seasons at the helm and the third Division I tournament in program history.

The Sharks will participate in the selection show on Monday at noon on ESPN2, live from campus.

LIU has posted a Division I program-record 37 wins this season.

Making only his second start since his freshman season, right-hander Nick Torres went 6 1/3 innings in the decisive game, handing a 5-0 lead over to Nick DeSalvo with two runners on base. It was Torres' longest outing since a shutout against Wagner on April 13, 2019. DeSalvo shut the door in the seventh.

"I was just going to go until I couldn't," Torres said.

Torres had taken the mound in the first inning with a two-run lead courtesy of an RBI double from Michael Edelman and run-scoring single from Carlton Harper.

Giovanni Ciaccio and Harper added RBI singles and Ciaccio scored on a passed ball in the fifth to open a five-run cushion.

It was Harper who had a two-run single in the 13th against Bryant on Saturday, in the resumption of a suspended game, which knocked the Bulldogs into the losers' bracket.

The Game 2 drama came after Bryant forced a final showdown in the championship round with a 7-2 victory earlier Sunday behind a complete game from Logan Frasier against the Sharks.
 
There were heroics throughout the NEC tournament for LIU (37-19).

Joshua Loeschorn earned the win in the opener with a 121-pitch performance against Fairleigh Dickinson. He then produced a 13th-inning save two days later, in the completion of a suspended game against Bryant — dramatically striking out conference Player of the Year Matt Woods with the tying runs on base to end the longest postseason game in NEC history.

Freshman Christopher Hund bashed two homers in that two-day game, while Jalen Wade started the Sharks off on the right foot with five scoreless innings.

Torres was named tournament MVP and was joined on the all-tourney team by Edelman, Loeschorn and Seth Surrett.

"They're grinders. They play so hard," Pirillo said about his squad. "They're never out of a game. They're never out of an at-bat."