Last modified: Sunday, June 15, 2008 9:45 AM CDT ROUND TRIP TICKET—Piggly Wiggly’s Tyler Kendrick skids home under the tag by Ham-mond catcher John Mike Williams to complete a tour of the bases on a triple and an error for Loranger’s first run in a 7-0 American Legion victory at Hammond High Thursday. John Lenz/Daily Star Piggly Wiggly takes over 1st From Staff Reports Suddenly, it's Loranger's Piggly Wiggly team all alone in first place in the America Legion Sixth District East's West Division. The newcomers from Loranger got suffocating pitching from Shea Edwards and Taylor Abdalla Thursday night as the pair combined to strike out 16 batters — including the last nine in a row — in a three-hit, 7-0 shutout of Hammond at the HHS diamond. Edwards and his pin-point breaking ball did most of the heavy lifting, hurling the first six innings and giving up all three hits and two walks while striking out 13 before Abdalla struck out the side in seventh-inning mop-up duty. "That was the story," agreed Loranger coach Jason Helmsetter. "Shea's been up and down a little bit, but we kind of tweaked something in the bullpen with him and he's starting to understand. "When he throws the ball down in the zone, he's going to be hard to beat. He doesn't throw overly hard so when he leaves it up, he gets hit. He saw that against St. Paul's, and tonight he made a complete turnaround." "He did a great job, and Abdalla came in and closed it out," Hammond coach Steve Labbe said. "They kept us off balance. Edwards did it with his curveball and did it well. He can throw two pitches in the zone for strikes." The victory boosted Loranger to 4-1 in district, alone in first place now after Ponchatoula's Pevey Realtors went in to Mandeville and got shut down by LLOG Exploration 3-2. LLOG center fielder Cody Keowen ended the game by robbing Reeve Kirkland of a game-changing, two-out hit with a diving catch in the outfield. The loss drops the Ponchatoula-based team to 3-2 in SDE West Division play and into a tie for second with LLOG. "It was one of the best catches I've seen all year," Pevey coach Mark Gosnell said. "He ran a long way to catch it. If that ball falls in, we score two runs. But that's baseball and the way it goes. It was a very good game, but they made the plays to win." Pevey returns to Athletic Park Saturday with a non-district round-robin with Fontainebleau and Rummel before starting the second round of Legion play next Tuesday at Piggly Wiggly. Piggly Wiggly 7, Hammond 0 If Edwards was the story on defense, the story on offense was Tyler Kendrick, who went 3-for-4 with two doubles, a triple, two runs scored and an RBI. "He's been swinging it well," Helmstetter said. "He's been playing with that travel team (Louisiana All-Stars) getting a little experience playing with those guys, and he's really seeing it well." Kendrick put Loranger on the board single-handedly in the second with a leadoff triple that resulted in him scoring on a Hammond error — one of eight committed by Hammond. Loranger then broke it open with three runs in the third as Taylor Abdalla beat out an infield hit, Kyle Wheeler was hit by a pitch, and Kendrick cranked an RBI double. Steve Mercier then stroked a two-run single to make it 4-0. Loranger put runners in scoring position in the next two innings but Hammond held them out. Not so in the sixth, when the hosts committed four errors around an RBI double by Zack Serigny that allowed Kyle Bracey, Brice Hymel and Jacob Trapani to score three unearned runs. "(Tors starter Lucas) Quebedeaux did pretty good for us," Labbe said. "He had the one inning where he kind of lost it a little bit and the one inning where we made a few errors behind him. "We've just got to keep working at the plate to get better and that's what we're doing. Not to use it a a crutch, but we are a young team and we're going to be fine. We see a lot of bright spots, and some teaching points out there, which is good for us." Chris Moran went 2-for-3 and John Mike Williams singled in the second to account for Hammond's hits. Loranger had nine hits, with Abdalla going 2-for-4 in addition to Kendricks' three safeties. LLOG Exploration 3, Pevey Realtors 2 MANDEVILLE — LLOG took an early lead in the first inning when Keowen and Blake Butera singled off of Pevey starter Dylan Hills, and Thomas Anderson doubled to give Mandeville a 2-0 lead. Pevey cut into the lead in the third as Elisha Settoon doubled off LLOG starter Chris Brady, and Justin Crowell doubled to drive him in and make it 2-1. Ponchatoula then tied it in the fifth when Hills reached on an infield single, moved to second on a fielder's choice and scored on Randall Meyers’ RBI double. However, Butera drove in a run with a double in the bottom of the fifth to give LLOG a 3-2 lead after five innings. Keowen's defense negated a Pevey scoring opportunity in the fifth, tracking down a sharply hit ball by Kirkland with men on first and second. Pevey stranded seven runners in scoring position. "We hit some balls hard with runners on," Gosnell said. "Sometimes we hit a line drive that someone runs down with runners on, or we grounded into a double play with a couple of runners on. It's just one of those things that if we would've found a hole or two, we'd probably score five or six runs." Hills took the loss after allowing five hits, three runs (two earned), striking out nine and walking one in six innings of work. Crowell and Settoon each had two hits to pace Pevey offensively. "We played well tonight, and that's the best we've played so far this summer," Gosnell said.