Mikey Blackhawk has been around the block long enough to hone his approach with his Post 4 Razorbacks, especially the ones who take the mound. He wants them to do one thing: throw strikes.

“But it just depends on how it comes across,” Blackhawk said. “You’ve got some coaches out there — ‘just throw strikes!’ Believe me, I know they know they’re trying to throw strikes. So it’s little things: Are they leading with their hip? Are they leading with their heel? Are they releasing out front? It’s things like that when they come off the field between innings, we can coach them up on.”

Thing is, Blackhawk didn’t need to do much of that on Friday, when the Razorbacks swept Buhl with wins of 20-3 and 10-0. On Saturday, the hosts reeled off two more wins, topping Burley 3-1 and 16-4. The Razorbacks’ offense revved into gear consistently, but the theme that hovered over all four wins like a fine mist was this: The club’s pitching.

In 23 innings, the Razorbacks yielded just eight runs. Their pitching staff engineered their offensive eruptions by stifling opposing offenses. Nick Ourada and Kudter Stucki started Friday’s games, allowing just two runs combined. On Saturday, Garrett Keller earned the win with 2 1/3 innings of one-run ball, yielding to Elias Blackhawk, who held Burley scoreless across 2 2/3 innings. Finally, in Saturday’s second game, Maddox Moore fanned eight in three innings, paving the way for his team’s fifth straight win.

It prompts a question: How are the Razorbacks pulling it off? The answer starts with the fact that Blackhawk has identified the arms he trusts most: Keller, Moore, Colton Durham and Elias Blackhawk. “Those are my four dudes,” Mikey Blackhawk says. The Razorbacks also roster guys like Stucki and Ourada, Taylor Stringfellow and Alex Romreill. “Those are some middle relief guys that we can count on,” Blackhawk adds.

Across these past five wins, they’ve come up aces.

“My fastball was working, and my curveball was working too, a little bit,” said Stucki, who registered two strikeouts in his four innings, allowing three hits. “I wasn’t too comfortable with it.”

For Stucki, the curveball is still coming along. You can’t blame him much. At Pocatello, he’s an everyday outfielder, using a combination of speed and range to help the Thunder reach last spring’s 4A state tournament, where the team fell in the consolation title game. Now, in legion ball, he’s still getting used to pitching regularly.

His teammates have made more progress on that front. After Stucki exited Friday’s nightcap, in came Alex Winn, who notched a pair of strikeouts in two scoreless innings. Less than 24 hours later, Keller and Blackhawk combined to allow just one run on three hits, tallying six strikeouts along the way. In the Razorbacks’ double-digit wins, those outings would have been nice. In that 3-1 game, they were invaluable.

“We just threw strikes tonight,” Stucki said. “We had defense backing us up. I don’t think we had many errors…. It’s definitely nice to have a good defense behind you.”

For the Razorbacks, that’s an important part of the calculus. The pitchers — all nine or 10 that Blackhawk throws out there — trust their defense. “It makes you so much more confident, knowing that your guys got your back,” Stucki said.

But let’s backtrack for a second, back to the first part of Stucki’s comment. They threw strikes. It hardly gets more cliche than that, but to Blackhawk, it’s the most important thing. He preaches it like an ordained minister, helping his players adjust their mechanics, which in turn helps them find the strike zone.

That’s the thing, though: Blackhawk knows the way he wants his guys to pitch, but he has to communicate it effectively. He’s smart enough to know they aren’t purposefully issuing walks. So he’s patient. Understanding. The Razorbacks have won five straight, so clearly, he’s doing something right.

“We’re saying, hey, this is what we see. This is what we need to work on this next inning,” Blackhawk said. “Let’s go out there and do it. For the most part, all the kids are really coachable and they do it, and they see the end result. So I think they’re finally bought in.”