GREENVILLE — Turner Brown’s two RBI single in the bottom of the ninth delivered Dwanya Williams-Sutton and Jeff Nelson for a 2-1 walk-off win for the East Carolina baseball team. The Pirates topped Southeastern Louisiana Friday to kick off the 13th Annual Keith LeClair Classic.

Evan Kruczynski threw a career-high 120 pitches over eight and a third innings of work. The junior southpaw allowed Jameson Fisher to single to center field to lead off the ninth inning. Kruczynski was pulled in favor of freshman Sam Lanier after getting the next Lion batter to fly out to center.

Carson Crites put runners on the corners with a single and Lanier was pulled for senior Nick Durazo. The Lions pulled off a safety squeeze with Ryan Byers at the plate and the Lions plated the first run of the night. The tally was charged to Kruczynski after a gritty outing. With one out, Chris Holba entered for No. 16 ECU (7-2) and caught a man stealing before getting Chris Eades to strikeout to end the inning.

SE Louisiana (5-4) starter Kyle Cedotal returned for the ninth with 102 pitches thrown. Eric Tyler waited patiently to start the inning and drew an eight-pitch walk. Brady Lloyd ran for Tyler and Williams-Sutton reached on an infield single. Nelson followed and was hit by Cedotal’s 117th pitch of the night.

With the bases loaded, Kirk Morgan grounded into a fielder’s choice before Brown came to the plate. The freshman played hero as he flared a 2-1 pitch into center field that sent Jacob Seward diving to try to save the game. Seward came up short and Williams-Sutton walked home from third and Nelson trotted in behind him to walk off with the win.

“I was hitting a lot of breaking balls all day,” Brown said. “Our philosophy was to stay late and I was sitting off speed, so I was trying to stay back and send it into center or drive it (to the opposite field).”

Kruczynski struck out seven in his big day and allowed just five hits while walking two. The junior ran into trouble in the first few innings, allowing runners into scoring position with one out in the first and second.

Godwin said his whole team played tense early on, including Kruczynski.

“He did get stronger as the game went on, he was not good early on. His stuff wasn’t good and I was worried about him,” Godwin said after the win. “He definitely got stronger as the game went on.”

Godwin was happy with his team’s patience at the plate against a National Player-of-the-Week in Cedotal. The senior lefty struck out 14 and allowed just two hits in a complete game to start his season and earned the honor from Louisville Slugger.

The Pirates struck out just four times and drew four walks against Cedotal while dropping in seven hits.