The Hickory Crawdads took down the Greenville Drive 9-2 on Friday night in the series opener.

Greenville jumped on Crawdads starting pitcher Mitch Bratt right away, scoring two in the first to take a 2-0 lead.

The Crawdads came back with four runs in the bottom of the second to take a lead which they would hold for the rest of the night. Abimelec Ortiz struck out to start the inning but reached on a passed ball on strike three. After Cody Freeman struck out, Geisel Cepeda, Daniel Mateo, Yosy Galan collected three straight hits to drive in the first run of the inning. Jayce Easley walked to bring in the tying run. Keyber Rodriguez popped out, scoring Mateo. A double steal with Easley taking second and Galan going home brought the score to 4-2.

The Crawdads rallied again in the fourth inning with three runs. Mateo hit the second pitch of the inning over the right field fence to give the team a three-run lead. Galan hit a ball to center that fell in front of the fielder. Easley bunted towards third and reached safely as the third baseman fumbled picking up the ball. Galan was caught stealing third, but Easley took second on the play and then successfully stole third. Rodriguez singled to left, bringing in Easley. Rodriguez stole second and third to bring his season total to 20 swiped bags. Tucker Mitchell hit a sacrifice fly to center that Rodriguez tagged up on and came in to score to make it a 7-2 game.

The ‘Dads added on a pair in the eighth. Galan walked to begin the inning before Rodriguez hit a rocket to the warning track in right-center for a stand up double to score him. Mitchell singled to shallow center and drove in the runner for the final run of the game.

The bullpen combined to throw 8.1 shutout innings after Bratt was removed after throwing 29 pitches and recording just two outs. Florencio Serrano pitched 3.1. innings, Ricky DeVito handled the fifth and sixth innings, Seth Clark recorded the next four outs, and Robby Ahlstrom took the ‘Dads the rest of the way.

The teams will meet again Saturday night as the Crawdads take on their Hickory Couch Potato identity. The first 1,000 fans will also receive an Evan Carter bobblehead.