New Iberia Senior High beat Westgate 6-1 Saturday night to claim its 18th win of the year and improve to 3-1 in district.

Zach Escuriex had his second hat trick of the season for the Yellow Jackets (18-4-3 overall), opening the scoring at the 14-minute mark off a pass from Tyler Inzerella. Escuriex scored the next goal off a throw-in by Chris Leeson and completed his hat trick when Blake Gary’s corner kick was headed by Inzerella and found Escuriex’s foot.

NISH coach Kevin Hardy praised Matt Fowler, Gary, Inzerella and Quentin Labiche for doing an especially good job.

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“Obviously Zach had a great game with the hat trick,” said Hardy. “He got us off to the start we needed to relax and play our game.”

The fourth goal, said Hardy, came off a nice move in the box by Daniel Victorino, who beat a defender and then sent a drop pass to Jacob Leleux, who fired in a left footer. The final goal of the half came when Seth Gary’s penalty shot bounced off the cross bar and was one-timed by Colby Delahoussaye on the rebound.

“We played well,” said Hardy. “It’s easy to get fired up for your biggest rival. The difficult thing is to not play tight in a matchup like that. I thought we played pretty relaxed. It helps that we have had some success this season which makes us confident. Everyone played well and everyone got to play. You can not ask for more than that.”

In the second half the Jackets increased their lead when a nice cross by Fowler was headed in by Josh Romero.

Westgate got on the board at the 55-minute mark on a beautiful free kick that curved in over goalie Aaron Moore. The last goal was by Seth Gary, who took the last of four shots within the big box.

“This has been an amazing season,” Hardy said. “I never dreamed we would be where we are today. I thought we would be rebuilding after losing 13 Seniors and nine starters. I would not have predicted half the number of victories we have at this point. All the credit goes to the kids and my coaching staff. The boys are very coachable and Brandon Francis, my co-head, has done another great job training them.”

The Jackets J.V. also won 4-0 on goals by Ian Romero, Binh Nguyen, Ian Romero, and Barron Kennedy.

New Iberia travels to face undefeated Lafayette in a district game Tuesday.

“The game against Lafayette is the biggest of the year for us,” Hardy said. “It will take an almost perfect game from us for us to win. Although we have gotten a lot of respect over the last two years and are currently ranked No. 12, we are possibly overrated because we have not played a really difficult schedule. However, I definitely feel we have overachieved and we have not lost to any teams that we should have beaten. It would be a huge upset for us to beat Lafayette although we are capable of it on a good night. It is great to be playing for a possible district title, but realistically we are focused on making the playoffs.”