Rhee Dae-eun scattered eight hits over seven scoreless innings, Takashi Ogino and Luis Cruz drove in five runs between them, and the Chiba Lotte Marines beat the Fukuoka Softbank Hawks in a 9-0 whitewash on Saturday afternoon.

Toshiaki Imae opened the scoring with a run-scoring single in the first and Ogino’s three-run triple along with Cruz’s two-run single keyed a seven-run frame, when the Marines sent 12 batters to the plate in the sixth at QVC Marine Field.

Rhee (3-0) struck out two and walked two against Tadashi Settsu (2-2), who was rocked for eight runs — two earned — on nine hits in 5-2/3 innings of the loss.

The Hawks were held scoreless despite rapping out eight hits.

Buffaloes 5, Lions 1

At Kobe’s Hotto Motto Field, Brandon Dickson came within one run of pitching a shutout to lead Orix in a rout of Seibu for its first two-game win streak this season.

Hikaru Ito opened the scoring in the second with a two-run single to spark the offense.

Eagles 4, Fighters 2

At Sendai’s Kobo Stadium, Takahiro Norimoto (1-2) labored through six innings of two-run ball en route to his first victory of the season in Tohoku Rakuten’s win over Hokkaido Nippon Ham.

Mitsutaka Goto and Gaby Sanchez had an RBI single and sac fly, respectively, in the sixth to give their team the lead for good.

CENTRAL LEAGUE

Giants 2, Tigers 1

At Koshien Stadium, Mauro Gomez had a pair of RBI singles, including one that broke a 1-1 tie in the sixth inning as Hanshin held off Yomiuri.

Atsushi Nomi (1-2) mixed up his fastball and changeup over seven innings of one-run ball for the win.

Dragons 3, Carp 2 (11)

At Hiroshima’s Mazda Stadium, Ryosuke Hirata hit a tiebreaking solo homer off Deunte Heath (0-2) with two outs in the 11th inning to lift Chunichi past Hiroshima.

Shinji Tajima (3-1) got the win in relief and Koji Fukutani picked up his fourth save.

Swallows 4, BayStars 0

At Tokyo’s Jingu Stadium, Yuhei Takai delivered a two-run double and Kazuhiro Hatakeyama belted a two-run drive in the sixth inning as Tokyo Yakult blanked Yokohama and moved into first place with its third win in a row.

Masanori Ishikawa (1-2) earned the victory.