ROCKLAND — Play hard, stay on your feet as best you can, and please, don’t get hurt.

Coach Mike Hathaway’s message was simple enough, and he knew that would be plenty to secure for his Leavitt Hornets their seventh win of the season.

Mission accomplished.

Six different players slogged their way into the end zone as the Hornets fought through a driving rain that put up nearly as much resistance as Oceanside’s defense to defeat the Mariners 44-14 at Wasgatt Field on Friday night.

“You want to get up early in a game like this so it’s not a game in the second half,” Leavitt coach Mike Hathaway said. “We ran some plays that allowed us to do that, and get our JVs in to close out the game.”

It didn’t take long for the high-flying Hornets to showcase their skills, and prove emphatically why they are the top-ranked team in Eastern Class B — all of two plays on offense, to be exact.

After forcing Oceanside to punt after three plays on it’s opening series, Leavitt handed the ball to Jake Ouellette up the middle from the Mariners’ 46. He scampered down to the 4-yard line, and then punched it into the end zone on the very next play to set the tone.

“You want to rely on your offensive line in a game and in conditions like this,” Hathaway said. “We pushed their guys off the ball and made holes, and our backs are pretty good runners.”

The onslaught continued on the Hornets’ next possession, again after a quick three-and-out from the Mariners. This time, Leavitt went with quarterback Jordan Hersom, who carried three times for 53 yards and a score.

Oceanside managed a first down on its next possession, but ultimately turned the ball over again on a botched punt. On the first play of the second quarter, Hersom hit Brian Bedard over the middle and the speedy receiver fought off a pair of tackles to reach the end zone. The ensuing two-point run was good, pushing Leavitt’s advantage to 22-0.

Two more three-and-outs and two more short punts again set the Hornets up with prime field positions, which they turned into scores by Ian Durgin — on a 73-yard run — and Oscar Rodriguez, and the rout was on.

Oceanside moved the ball a bit at the end of the first half against half of Leavitt’s second-team defense, but failed to reach the end zone before the buzzer sounded.

Leavitt added one more TD in the third quarter, a keeper from backup quarterback Tyler Chicoine, but scored no more once the second and third sets of offensive players began seeing regular action.

The Mariners, meanwhile, capitalized on the fresh faces in the Leavitt lineup in the third frame. Dan Hendricks slid through a hole in the line and raced for 57 yards and a score with 2:17 to play in the quarter, and Dan Stone added another for Oceanside 19 seconds later after a fumble recovery set the Mariners up at the Leavitt 10.

There was little thought of a letdown for the Hornets, though, even after an emotional victory over Mt. Blue a week ago.

” Our kids have been around; they know better than that,” Hathaway said. “Our whole week was about getting better. That’s how our weeks are. It doesn’t matter who we play. We had some things we needed to work on this week. We worked hard on them, and I feel like we got better and we’ll take the same approach next week.”