Austin Hemmingson | Daily Press Gladstone’s Cody Frappier (right) safely beats the throw to Negaunee first baseman Tyler Robinson (6) while Negaunee’s Carter Richardson looks on during an American Legion Zones tournament baseball game Thursday at Gladstone.

GLADSTONE — The Gladstone Indians just reminded everyone why they’re two-time defending Class A state champions. After a relatively mediocre regular season, the Indians kicked off postseason play by mercying Negaunee 10-0 in five innings in an American Legion Zones tournament baseball game at Don Olsen Field here Thursday.

Leading 2-0 entering the top of the fourth inning, the Indians flipped a switch and scored eight runs in a hurry to take a 10-0 lead and put the game well out of reach. The big swings of the inning came on back-to-back two-run doubles by Cooper Cavadeas and Dan Martin.

“Now that we’re in the postseason, everyone’s starting to buckle down and realize that there’s no innings that we can sleep during and we got to be ready to play every inning in every game,” Indians’ manager Justin Jurek said.

While the offense was busy doing its thing, Carson Shea casually threw four shutout innings before Parker Frappier came on to close it out in the fifth.

“Obviously, Carson threw really well and kept them off balance,” Jurek said. “He had great defense behind him. I think we played error-free baseball today. Any time you can do that, you’re putting your pitcher in a good position to succeed.”

The Indians (13-6) opened the scoring with a pair of runs in the third inning. Shea and Cavadeas led off with back-to-back hits to put runners on second and third. Martin drove in a run with a sacrifice fly and Jared Crow followed with a sacrifice bunt for another run.

“Offensively, we got off to a little slow start,” Jurek said. “But in the second inning, we got what we wanted out of it. And then in the third, obviously, the bats came alive. Then, Parker came in to close it out for us. It’s nice to have guys like Parker that can come in and close out the game to save your starters.”

Cavadeas led the offense with three hits and two RBIs, Martin added a hit and three RBIs and Shea had a pair of hits.

After keeping the score close early, Negaunee couldn’t do much right.

“That was really bad defensive baseball today,” Negaunee manager Jason Siik said. “It’s kind of tough to see that in a tournament. We got to shake it off and come back tomorrow morning. There’s not much to say about this … it was a tough game.

“I thought we started out great the first two innings. Jake (Adriano) was pitching well, I thought our defense looked good, and then the wheels kind of fell off and we couldn’t bail the boat out fast enough.”

Adriano absorbed the loss, surrendering 10 runs in 3 2/3 innings before Tanner Peterson came on to pitch the final 1 1/3.

Carter Richardson was the bright spot offensively, notching a pair of hits.

Gladstone hosts Menominee today at 5:30 and Bark River at 7:30, while Negaunee plays Menominee at 11 a.m. and Bark River at 2.

Teams with the top two records in pool play advance to the semifinals Saturday, with the third place and championship games to follow. The top three finishers qualify for the state tournament next weekend in Gladwin.

Siik said some changes are coming for today’s games.

“We’re going to make some position changes,” he said. “It’s been a tough year getting all our guys together. Now we’re together, but they’re out of sync and have chemistry issues out there. We’ll do some position changes tomorrow, and we’re going to throw Taylor (Laurin). He does a good job at keeping the ball down and getting ground balls.”