Photo by Kim North Union Local’s Hayden Jenkins (24) looks to have avoided the tag of Buckeye Local catcher Alex McDiffitt during the third inning Friday in Morristown.

MORRISTOWN — A pair of struggling high school baseball teams met Friday on sun-splashed Jets Field, with one team trying to gain some momentum for the upcoming postseason, while the other continued to hurt itself with mistakes.

Union Local (4-13) batted around in the second and third innings while scoring 11 runs en route to an OHSAA mercy-rule-shortened, 12-2, triumph over visiting Buckeye Local in four-and-a-half innings.

The victory allowed the Jets to earn a regular-season sweep of the Panthers (4-13), the other win coming on April 9 by a 13-8 count in Connorville.

“We came out early, put the bat on the ball and put the pressure on Buckeye Local to make the plays,” Union Local head coach Jim Hess said of his team’s first shortened victory of the campaign. “We’re struggling right now, so we’ll take a win any way we can get one.

“I told the kids going into tonight to just go out and have fun,” Hess said. “Maybe we can get hot before tournament time and put something together.”

Leading 1-0 after scoring an unearned run in the bottom of the first, Union Local sent 10 betters to the plate in a five-run second. The Jets played some station-to-station with consecutive RBI singles off the bats of Braylon Akers, Billy Schumacher, Colby Carpenter and Logan Hess before winning pitcher Evan White singled down the first baseline to score two runs, making it 6-0.

Alex Moore drew a leadoff walk and Braylon Akers beat out a slow roller to short. Schumacher’s bloop single to shallow right-center chased in a run; Carpenter slapped a 0-1 pitch through the left side of the infield; and Logan Hess dropped a hit into shallow right.

Akers started a six-run third with an infield single and Schumacher singled to left. Carpenter laid down a sacrifice bunt that he beat out. With one out and runners on second and third, the left-handed hitting White sliced a single down the left field line that knocked in two more runs. A third runner — Hayden Jenkins — tried to score from first when the ball was bobbled in the outfield, but was pegged out on a nice relay throw. Jenkins was initially called safe, but after the umpires got together, the call was overruled, but the damage had already been done.

“Not happy at all,” Buckeye Local head coach Jeffery Patrick said of his team’s lackluster performance. “Not good enough offensively or defensively.”

Schumacher led the Jets’ 10-hit attack — nine singles and a triple — with a trio of safeties. Peyton Causby tripled in a run and continued on home when the throw from the outfield skipped past three Buckeye Local players before bouncing over the third base dugout and out of play.

White, the everyday catcher who was making his first start of the season and only his second mound appearance, pitched his way out of jams in the first and fourth frames while giving up the two runs in the third when he walked the first two batters. Alex McDiffitt walked with the bases loaded to force in the first run, while Jake Berry’s flyball to center was deep enough to plate the second. White struck out two, walked three and hit a pair. He allowed three singles — all off the bat of leadoff hitter Mason Griffin.

“Mason had a good game at the plate, but he had a pair of baserunning mistakes,” Patrick noted. “Other than him at the plate, we were pretty non-existent.

“Evan pitched pretty well. He struggled at times, but battled his way out of trouble,” Hess added.

Patrick agreed.

“Their pitcher threw strikes,” he said. “That’s the name of the game.”

The Panthers committed five errors and lined into a third-to-first double play with non outs in the seventh.

The Panthers are back in action Saturday as they host Edison.