The Hickory Crawdads continued their scorching start to the second half Wednesday night, using early offense and dominant pitching to defeat the Myrtle Beach Pelicans 6-2 at Pelicans Ballpark.

With the victory, Hickory improved to 10-1 in the second half and 44-31 overall, matching its best stretch of baseball this season. The Crawdads have won the first two games of the six-game series.

Hickory wasted little time taking control.

Marco Argudin drew a leadoff walk in the first inning, advanced to second and scored on Paulino Santana’s RBI single to center, giving the Crawdads a 1-0 lead.

The offense broke the game open in the second.

Daniel Flames opened the inning with a single before Braylin Morel launched a two-run home run to left-center, his second homer of the season, extending the advantage to 3-0. Sebastian Baquera followed with a single and eventually scored when Argudin lined a two-out RBI single to make it 4-0.

The Crawdads added two more runs in the third. Santana worked a one-out walk before Angel Arredondo doubled into the left-field corner. Marcos Torres brought home Santana with a groundout, and Deward Tovar followed with an RBI single to push the lead to 6-0.

That was more than enough support for right-hander Moises Morales.

Morales scattered just two hits over five shutout innings while striking out five and walking one to improve to 6-2 on the season. He threw 42 of his 64 pitches for strikes and never allowed the Pelicans to mount a serious threat.

The Hickory bullpen preserved the lead the rest of the way. Luis Villar worked 1 2/3 scoreless innings with two strikeouts before Dylan McReynolds struck out three over 1 1/3 perfect frames.

Myrtle Beach finally broke through in the ninth against Nick Marinaro. Derniche Valdez singled before Jairo Diaz delivered an RBI double to end the shutout bid. Edward Vargas added a run-scoring groundout, but Marinaro recorded the final out to secure the victory.

The Crawdads finished with seven hits, highlighted by Morel’s two-run homer. Argudin scored once, drove in two runs and reached base twice. Santana collected an RBI single and scored twice, while Arredondo doubled and crossed the plate. Baquera added a hit and scored, and Tovar drove in his team-leading 48th run of the season.

Hickory pitchers combined to limit Myrtle Beach to five hits while striking out 11 batters. Although the staff issued seven walks, the Pelicans were held scoreless until the ninth inning.

David Bracho (1-2) took the loss for Myrtle Beach after allowing six runs over three innings.

The series continues Thursday night at Pelicans Ballpark. Hickory is expected to send right-hander Jesus Laflaise (1-5, 4.88 ERA) to the mound against Myrtle Beach left-hander Pierce Coppola (0-5, 3.50 ERA), with first pitch scheduled for 7:05 p.m.