TURNER – Strong winds played havoc with their defense and Jeremy Lockhart toyed with their bats for the first six innings of their Patriot’s Day matinee, but the Leavitt Hornets still made Waterville nervous before the Panthers pulled out an 8-6 win.

Leavitt scored four runs and got the tying run on base in the seventh before Ryan Lockard relieved a tiring Lockhart and struck out Levi Jackson looking for the final out that thwarted the Hornets’ comeback.

Keeping the Hornets off-balance with a sharp curve ball, Lockhart yielded just two hits and no earned runs before coming out for the seventh inning. He ended up going 6 1/3, striking out five while walking just two.

“Lockhart started that last inning around 91 pitches and I wasn’t planning on pitching him in the seventh, but I guess I’m getting soft in my old age because he asked me to let him go out (for the seventh),” said Waterville coach Dick Whitten.

“He stayed away from walks, especially early on, and in high school baseball, if you give up walks and errors, they’re going to score runs,” he added.

The Hornets (2-2) served as a prime example of that. Starter Jordan Morris walked two batters in the first and both scored when Chad Moore’s base hit to right skipped under Lance Poland’s glove for the first of five Hornet errors.

“We didn’t play well in the field. We didn’t make the little plays, just knowing what to do with the ball,” said Leavitt coach Dave Morin. “We gave them two or three runs with simple mistakes. We’ve got to be more mentally focused.”

“Jordan fell behind in the count and that’s getting us back on our heels a little bit,” he added. “When he was getting ahead, they couldn’t do much with him.”

Morris (six runs, five hits, 7 Ks, five walks in five innings) had six strikeouts through the first two innings, but caught a tough break in the third when Lockard’s fly ball to right got caught up in the wind and eluded Poland, putting a runner at third with one out. Mike Denis followed with an RBI single to left to make it 3-1. A pair of Leavitt errors to start the third helped the Panthers widen the lead to 4-1.

“We took advantage of extra bases from their mistakes and that’s what ended up winning the ball game,” Whitten said.

The Hornets plated their first run in the second on Tony Pirruccello’s RBI single. They stranded a pair of runners in each of the next two innings, however, and saw the deficit balloon to 6-1 in the sixth as Waterville (3-1) scored two runs on another error and a sacrifice fly.

Leavitt got one back in the sixth on Brandon Smith’s sacrifice fly, but Waterville answered in the seventh on Lockhart’s sacrifice fly that ended up scoring two runs on a throwing error by the cutoff man.

The Hornets strung four consecutive hits together with one out in the seventh to put Lockhart on the ropes. Chad Schrepper’s RBI single and a Waterville throwing error cut the lead in half at 8-4. After a fly out recorded the second out, Pirruccello plated two more with a single, then Smith walked to put the tying run on. Whitten then summoned his ace, Lockard, to earn the save with a 1-2 curve ball that froze Jackson.

Schrepper and Pirruccello each had two hits to lead the Hornets while Jake Signer scored three runs. Denis was Waterville’s top hitter with a pair of hits.