RIVERDALE - Jordan Dee scattered five hits over six innings, Jefferson backed him with some timely two-out hits and the J-Hawks beat Pleasant Valley, 5-2, Tuesday in a nonconference baseball game at Pleasant Valley High School.

Jefferson (4-6) had eight hits. Dee and Alex Larson had two each. The J-Hawks stranded 12 runners -- nine in scoring position -- but came up with three key two-out hits that plated runs.

Michael Rooney's two-out, two-strike RBI single in the fourth inning broke a 1-1 tie and put the J-Hawks ahead to stay. Larson followed with a two-run double. Drew Striegel's two-out RBI single in the sixth plated an insurance run.

"That's what wins games, right there," Rooney said of the two-out hits. "It's something we've been preaching about in practice. We came through today and we came out on top."

Jefferson Coach Mike Kuba said he made a special point of talking about two-strike hitting after the J-Hawks lost a pair of games at Iowa City High on Monday night.

"That's a weakness of ours, 0-2 hitting," Kuba said. "We've been doing a lot of rounds of 0-2 hitting. Hopefully, it pays off for us."

Larson, a senior playing his first season for Jefferson after transferring from Kennedy, said he thinks the J-Hawks finally got some of the breaks they haven't been getting.

"We've been hitting the ball hard, we just haven't been getting those key hits and stringing them together," he said. "We've had some unlucky bounces or hitting right at someone, so it's nice to get one that pieces it all together."

That included on the mound, where Dee kept the Pleasant Valley (7-3) hitters off balance by painting the corners with strikes and slipping in an occasional changeup. He struck out the first three batters of the game, two on changeups. He fanned only one more batter, but had the Spartans beating the ball into the ground. He also walked only one. Both runs off him were unearned.

"The biggest thing for me was since the curveball wasn't locating for a strike, I kept the ball low so they couldn't pull it," said Dee, who notched his first varsity pitching victory. "They rolled over a lot of groundballs."

Kuba said Dee's performance was clutch for the J-Hawks, who used four pitchers against City High and have three games remaining this week.

"He did a great job of keeping the ball down," Kuba said. "That's a pretty hefty hitting team, 1 through 7, and we knew they were going to put the ball in play. We knew our pitchers had to keep the ball down and really locate."

Larson pitched the seventh inning and picked up the save.

Jefferson hosts Davenport West on Wednesday night. The J-Hawks play a doubleheader at Cedar Falls on Friday.

"We've been up-and-down all year," Rooney said. "It feels good to play well. Hopefully, we can take this momentum into the rest of the week and finish the week off well. We could use a little run here to get going."

JEFFERSON (5)
Tanner Unkel, 2b, 3 2 1 0, Michael Rooney, cf, 3 1 1 1, Alex Larson, 3b-p, 4 0 2 2, Aaron Gruwell, pr, 0 1 0 0, Jordan Dee, p, 3 0 2 0, Hunter Scott, pr, 0 0 0 0, Sam Techau, 3b, 0 0 0 0, Drew Striegel, c, 3 0 1 1, Drake Vanous, cr, 3 0 1 1, Ky Kramer, ss, 3 0 0 0, Bailey Hollingsworth, rf, 3 0 0 0, Jake Schmidt, rf, 1 0 0 0, Jordan McCormick, 1b, 3 0 1 0, Christian Knox, lf, 4 1 0 0. Totals 30 5 8 4.

PLEASANT VALLEY (2)
Blake Wilson, c, 4 0 1 0, LJ Redmond, cr, 0 0 0 0, Cory Clark, cf, 4 0 1 0, Casey Addelia, ss, 4 0 0 0, Craig Ralston, rf, 3 1 0 0, David Conway, 3b-2b, 2 1 2 0, Ben Trewyn, p-3b, 2 0 1 1, Brady Hanna, dh-p, 3 0 0 1, Jordan Kinning, 2b, 0 0 0 0, Brock Neuhaus, p, 0 0 0 0, Brandon Sheeder, lf, 3 0 1 0, Trent Kress, 1b, 2 0 0 0, Brayden Weinschenk, pr, 0 0 0 0. Totals 27 2 6 2.

Jefferson           100 301 0 -- 5  8  2
Pleasant Valley   010 001 0 -- 2  6  2

Dee, Larson (7) and Striegel. Trewyn, Neuhaus (3), Hanna (7) and Wilson. W - Dee. L - Neuhaus. Sv - Larson.
2B - Larson, McCormick, Clark, Conway.