PISCATAWAY, NJ - The NJIT men's baseball team saw its offense catch fire early on Wednesday, but Rutgers' bats woke up late and the Scarlet Knights rallied to defeat the Highlanders 9-7 at Bainton Field. 

Ty Sallie and Ray Ortiz led off the game with a bunt single and walk, respectively, and came around to score to give the Highlanders an early 2-0 advantage. Grant Vurpillat pitched a perfect bottom of the first to keep the score 2-0 and after NJIT went down in the second, Drew Standen pitched a perfect inning of his own in the bottom half.

NJIT doubled its lead to 4-0 in the third on a two-out hit from freshman Brandon Peterson. The two RBIs were the first of Peterson's career and followed his first-career hit in the second.

Standen tossed another scoreless inning in the home half of the third, before the top of the NJIT lineup once again caused havoc in the fourth. Ty Sallie led the inning off with another single and Ortiz and Luke Longo followed it up with back-to-back home runs to make the score 7-0 Highlanders.

From there, the Rutgers offense took over as the Scarlet Knights scored three in the fifth and five in the sixth to take the lead. 

NJIT threatened in the eighth and had two runners in scoring position with one out, but was unable to tie the game and Rutgers added an insurance run in the eighth to make the final score 9-7.

Three different Highlanders had three hits, including Peterson who led the team with three. Sallie was 2-for-4 with a pair of walks and two runs scored.

The HIghlanders return to action this weekend when they host UAlbany in a there-game America East series in Union, NJ. Check back to NJITHighlanders.com and @NJTechBaseball on twitter for updated game times as inclement weather is in the forecast on Saturday.