North Pike and Brookhaven are two of the hottest baseball teamsin the Southwest Mississippi area and the state playoffs are fastapproaching. Both teams stepped out of divisional play to do battleat Moyer Field on Tuesday night.

The Panther bats would erupt for 9 runs in their half of thefifth, evoking the 10-run rule to the tune of an 11-1 win over thevisiting Jaguars. Junior pitcher Brandt Hinton authored the win,allowing 1 earned run on 5 hits with 6 strikeouts and no walks.

The defending 4A state champions improved to 14-10 overall,winners of 9 of their last 10 games. North Pike fell to 15-4. TheJaguars are ranked No. 5 in the latest Southwest MS Super 7poll.

Brookhaven travels to McComb Friday for its final Division 6-4Atest at Rotary Field for a JV/Varsity doubleheader, starting at 5p.m. North Pike closes its regular season at McComb Saturday at 1p.m.

Brookhaven 11, North Pike 1

The Jags took an early 1-0 in the top of the first. LeftfielderCasey Paulk and centerfielder Landon Morgan singled. Pitcher JeremyLofton grounded out to third, advancing Paulk and Morgan to thirdand second respectively. With a 2-2 count on Robert Glen Lord,Hinton uncorked a wild pitch that allowed Paulk to score.

That would be all of the runs for North Pike, as the game becamea pitcher’s duel between Hinton and Lofton; until the fourth.

“Brandt pitched well tonight,” said Panther head coach RandySpring. “We are starting to peak at the right time.”

Ole Brook claimed a 2-1 lead in the fourth and never lookedback. With 1 out, senior first baseman Grant McDonnieal doubled.Two batters later and with 2 outs, Paxton King was hit by a pitchfrom Lofton. Second baseman Elliot Warren singled to scoreMcDonnieal. Hinton helped his cause at the plate; singling to scoreKing.

“We got some hits tonight, and scored some runs too,” addedSpring who was referring to the 9-run explosion in the fifth.

The Panthers sent 12 batters to the plate, etched out 5 hitsthat included a 3-run inside-the-park homer from senior DariusPerkins. Warren had a 2 RBI double, scoring Crockett andMcDonnieal. McDonnieal’s single score designated hitter GarionCrockett for the game-ender.

McDonnieal led Ole Brook in the game, going 4-for-4 with 3singles, a double and 2 runs scored. Warren singled, doubled andscored a run. Perkins homered, scored twice with 3 RBIs. All 9positions in the Panther batting order had either a hit, an RBI ora scored a run.

“This was a good night all-around for us,” added Spring who isin his sixth year at BHS.

North Pike, coached by George Lott, also got Lord, and RockyWicker. Chase Coon doubled. Lofton suffered the loss in 4 innings,allowed 2 earned runs on 4 hits; fanning 2 Panther batters with nowalks.