Austin Shenton hit a towering home run into the nature preserve over the right center field wall in the bottom of the 12^th inning to lift FIU to an 8-7 walk-off victory over Old Dominion on Saturday night at Infinity Insurance Park.

With the win the Panthers improved to 12-13 overall and 3-2 in Conference USA play. The Monarchs are now 8-13 and 1-4 in league play.

The walk-off homer was one of two clutch long balls for Shenton. With FIU down 7-6 in the bottom of the ninth inning, the left-handed hitting Shenton hit an opposite field solo shot to tie the score.

Shenton was 5 for 6 with two RBI and is now tied for the team lead in home runs (8) with Jose Garcia. Shenton had three singles for his first three hits on the night.

FIU jumped out to a 5-0 lead after four innings. Back-to-back doubles in the third helped build the Panthers lead. Garcia had a two-run double and Adan Fernandez doubled home Garcia to highlight the early scoring for the Panthers.

ODU rallied against FIU starter Nick MacDonald to tie the score in the sixth. The Monarchs scored five runs off MacDonald, who exited after 5 2/3 innings.

The Monarchs took a 7-5 lead in the eighth. After a one-out walk, ODU got three consecutive hits off reliever Andres Nunez to push across two runs.

Before Shenton tied it in the bottom of the ninth, ODU reliever Hunter Gregory (3-3) helped the Panthers with an errant pick off throw to first base. Seth Cannady motored around to third base and later scored on a sacrifice fly by Javier Valdes.

Nifty relief pitching aided the Panthers. Chandler Raiden, Everett Hurst and Christian Santana (2-2) provided 4 2/3 scoreless relief innings before Shenton won it.

On deck, FIU goes for the sweep of ODU at 12 p.m. Sunday.