MOORESVILLE — South Rowan launched the opening volley in its American Legion playoff series with Mooresville Saturday night.

Post 185/146 took a one-game-to-none lead in the best-of-seven series with a well-played 7-1 victory over the host Moors. Game 2 is scheduled for 7:15 p.m. tonight at South Rown High School.

“Winning the first game is huge,” outfielder Adam Cornelius said after South (9-14) broke serve and collected the third postseason victory — and first since 1998 — in program history. “I know they had lost their player (injured Michael McClain) and were probably gonna come out and win it for him. This has to drop them off their emotional high.”

Conversely, you’d think it would push South’s through the ceiling. Not so, according to coach Allen Wilson.

“That’s one, but we have three more to win,” he said. “In a seven-game series the first one’s always important. But we’ve got to come out (Sunday) and be just as focused, play just as good defense and pitch and hit as well as we did tonight. Because they’re a good team.”

Second-seeded Mooresville (15-10) was an air-tight team for seven innings. Not until the top of the eighth, when South rallied for six unearned runs, did the Moors look like a beaten group.

“We made a big error to let them in the ballgame and never recouped,” said losing coach Whitey Meadows. “It was a good game up until that point.”

That point came when South’s Greg Deal chopped a one-out pitch from Chris Mills that first-basemen Kyle Allison fielded and flipped to the pitcher covering the bag. When it squibbed out of his glove, South had the break it needed.

“Then they just collapsed,” said Gabe Beaver, the 14-year old South infielder who went 3-for-4 and scored twice. “I don’t know if they were tired or what, but that error got us going.”

Teammate Aaron Safrit followed with a walk before Cornelius grounded a two-out single up the middle. Deal scored easily to snap a 1-1 tie and Safrit alertly circled the bases when the ball skipped past Mooresville center-fielder Michael Sandlin.

“I knew I hit it on the barrel and I thought (Sandlin) came up with it clean,” said Cornelius. “When it got by him it turned into the biggest play of the game. After that they really got down, we got a couple of hits and just made things work.”

South’s Jeremy Alderman and Beaver added run-scoring hits for a 5-1 edge and two more runs scored on a throwing error. When the smoke cleared, South had sent 10 batters to the plate and chased Mills (3-2).

The victory went to get-it-done right-hander Brandon Hiatt (1-0), who contributed 3 1/3 innings of hitless relief. He relieved starter Andrew Morgan, the lefty who pitched three-hit ball for 5 2/3 innings but issued eight walks in a hard-to-gauge performance.

“He walked a lot of guys but he’s a sophomore pitching in the biggest game of his life,” said Wilson. “That’s the second-place team and he held them to one run. That’s pretty good stuff.”

Hiatt’s was even better. He retired nine of the 11 batters he faced and caught Allison looking at a game-ending change-up.

“I was hoping to go three-up, three-down that last inning and I did,” he smiled. “Everyone on the bench was ragging me because they wanted to go home. That last pitch wasn’t even what it was supposed to be. I was supposed to do a shakeoff, to make the batter think. But I threw the change and he took it and that was it.”

NOTES: Game 2 starters will be South’s Nick Mayle (2-2) and Mooresville’s Seth Graham. ...The Moors will be without second-baseman Justin Graham, who was ejected for arguing and must sit out a game.

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Contact David Shaw at sports@salisburypost.com .