Vicksburg High used Tuesday’s cold-weather home opener against Yazoo City as a bridge from Saturday’s two-game set in Columbia toward this week’s Mid-Mississippi Classic games.

The Gators walked the bridge by bashing the visiting Indians 17-4 in five innings at Bazinsky Field.

Vicksburg coach Jamie Creel liked how his team improved from Saturday’s season-opening doubleheader split. Vicksburg (2-1) begins play in the Mid-Mississippi Classic on Thursday, taking on Brandon. Then on Friday night, the Gators will face Alabama powerhouse Cullman at Northwest Rankin.

“I thought we played well down in Columbia and we got better tonight. We faced a really good pitcher in Game 2 in Columbia, but we came out today and swung the bat well early,” Creel said.

Vicksburg beat Poplarville 9-1, but then lost to Columbia 8-3 on Saturday. The Gators came back against the Indians by getting hits from five of their first six batters. Taylor Brocato had a two-run single while Cody Waddell followed with an RBI single that hit the third base bag to score Jacob Thomas for a 4-0 lead. Justin Pettway’s fly out to left scored Brocato for a 5-0 first-inning lead.

Three passed balls and two errors set up an eight-run second inning as the Gators built a 13-0 lead. Creel subbed in his second team during the last two innings.

Keaton Jones started and went three innings, allowing just a second-inning single to Yazoo City’s Justin Gainwell. He struck out three.

“Jacob (Thomas) is our No. 1 and then it’s the rest of us,” Jones said. “I just mainly wanted to throw strikes.”

The Gators’ starting nine combined for seven hits through two innings. The backups got three hits, keyed by a two-run double from Antonio Williams that made it 17-1.

Yazoo City struck for three runs against reliever Justin Mills in the fifth inning. Tre Richardson belted a two-run home run to pace the Indians.

Jones and Creel know the Gators won’t get too many games like this over the next couple of weeks.

“Over the next three weeks we get to see what kind of men we’ve got. But I can say I’m really excited about this team.” Creel said.

“We get to see how well we can play,” Jones said. He had two hits and scored twice to lead the Gators. Brocato and Pettway drove in two runs each. Jalen Nelson took the loss for Yazoo City.

Contact Jeff Byrd at jbyrd@vicksburgpost.com