DaShawn Keirsey Jr. continued his hot hitting since returning to the St. Paul Saints from an injury, and he was joined by most of the Saints’ lineup in their 8-2 win over the Iowa Cubs on Saturday in Des Moines, Iowa.

Keirsey went 3 for 4 with a double and an RBI, raising his average this season to .316. He returned to the Saints on June 22 after missing nearly a month with a calf injury and has had a hit in all seven games since, including four multi-hit games. The center fielder, who was drafted in the fourth round in 2018 by the Twins, is hitting .394 (13 for 33) in those seven games and has a 13-game hitting streak overall.

One night after Keirsey’s two hits were the Saints’ only hits in an 8-1 loss to the I-Cubs, eight of the nine hitters in the St. Paul lineup recorded hits, and six drove in runs.

Edouard Julien and Yunior Severino each had two hits, Chris Williams hit his fifth home run of the season, and Brooks Lee and Anthony Prato had doubles.

All that offense backed one of the best pitching performances of the season for Gus Varland. The former North St. Paul and Concordia-St. Paul standout pitched five scoreless innings, allowing four hits while striking out seven and walking two.

The performance stopped a stretch of rocky outings by Varland. He had allowed four runs or more in six of his previous nine outings and last Sunday had allowed 11 earned runs on 11 hits in 2 1/3 innings against Toledo.

Josh Winder followed Varland and allowed two runs on three hits with four strikeouts over two innings. Ryan Jensen pitched a scoreless eighth, striking out one and walking two, and Jeff Brigham struck out the side in the ninth to finish the game.

The Saints scored a run in the first and another in the second before breaking things open with a four-run fourth inning. Prato drove in a run with a double and then scored on a single by Julien. Following a single by Matt Wallner, Severino hit a two-out single to left field to score Julien from third. Keirsey followed with a single to score Wallner.

After winning three of the first five games of the series, which opened the second half of the American Association’s International League season, the Saints will go for a series win in the final today which starts at 1 p.m.