By RYAN ARENA

L’Observateur

EDGARD – West St. John got back on the winning track this week, notching wins over East Iberville and Haynes after enduring a rough stretch of play.

The Rams traveled to East Iberville Wednesday and took a 16-9 District 8-1A decision that WSJ broke open in the sixth inning, aided by Kenneth Dabney’s two-run home run to left field that made it 11-6.

West St. John (6-6, 1-3) tacked on five more runs, mostly on bases-loaded walks.

“They’re in a similar situation to ours in that they’re stretched thin in their pitching,” said West St. John coach Lennix Madere. “They just issued walk after walk after walk … they’d run out of pitching.”

Barry Hanson and Kenneth Taylor each went 2-for-3 in the game. Taylor had three RBIs.

Reynaldo Trench picked up the win for West St. John.

On Tuesday, the Rams knocked off Haynes in Edgard, 18-6, in non-district action.

Hanson and Taylor led the way again, each going 2-for-4 with two RBIs. Hanson doubled and tripled. Jarius Moll was 2-for-3.

Madere said the focus was on limiting walks and that two of his hurlers stepped up to the challenge in Austin Howard and Jarius Moll.

“We’d walked 35 batters in our three prior games,” said Madere. “I told our guys that if you walk two in an inning, then you’re going to come out. Jackson came in for us in the second and gave us three good innings. Jarius Moll struck out the last six batters of the game.”