EDENTON — The Edenton Steamers completed the most wildly-successful regular season in franchise history Tuesday night when they routed the Outer Banks Daredevils 11-3 before the largest home crowd of the year.

With 1,315 fans on hand to bear witness, the Steamers finished the regular season with a 44-11 record. They won five more games than any previous Edenton team, finished 10 games ahead of their nearest competitor in the Coastal Plain League and set a league record for most wins in a half season (25) en route to breezing to first- and second-half titles in the North Division.

“It’s been amazing,” said Steamers coach Dirk Kinney, whose team will be the top seed in the Petitt Cup playoffs, which begin tonight when Edenton is at Peninsula in the opener of a best-of-three first-round series. “They’ve only known me for two months, but they bought into a system right away and have played hard every night.

“There’s a lot of talent on this team. But I’m a little shell-shocked thinking about us going 25-3 in the second half. If we had just gone 20-8 it would have been a helluva thing.”

Now, of course, whatever the Steamers — who are ranked No. 1 in the country among college summer league teams for the fourth straight week — accomplished so far is irrelevant as eight CPL teams start the postseason with 0-0 records.

Still, there’s no reason to think the Steamers can’t win their first Petitt Cup title since 2005. They played superior ball throughout the summer, establishing more than a dozen team and CPL records.

The Steamers led the league in both hitting (.282) and earned-run average (2.84) and set league marks in runs (370 — 54 more than 2011 runnerup Florence), RBIs (322), walks (280) and on-base percentage (.388).

Four regulars — Joe Wendle (.377 average), Zach Stewart (.324), Bo Bigham (.349) and Tim Saunders (.304) — batted over .300 with Brian Blasik (.297), Ryan Brenner (.286) and Brett Christopher (.294) right behind. Nine players drove in more than 20 runs and Adam Giacalone slugged a team-high seven home runs.

The Steamers also led the CPL in stolen bases (131) by a wide margin, with Brenner’s 35 the most among league individuals. Christopher swiped 22, Blasik 18 and Saunders 17.

“I feel real good about the offense,” Kinney said. “We can play smallball, we can play big flyball, we can play hit-and-run.”

While pitching carried the team through much of the first half, the Steamers’ starters have not been quite as dominating since the All-Star break.

And that’s largely because four of the players who made up most of the starting rotation around that time are no longer with the team.

All-Stars Josh Branstetter (4-1, 1.34 ERA) and Brooks Fiala (4-2, 2.58)) are out for the season with injuries, Quintavious Drains (2-0, 1.33 in four starts) left to attend summer classes and David Bartuska (2-3, 4.11) was dismissed for undisclosed off-the-field issues.

“Compared to a few weeks ago, it’s definitely different guys,” Kinney said. “You lose your No. 1 and No. 2 guys, especially, and that’s a big deal.

“We’re not trying to re-invent the wheel, though. If our starters can get us to the fifth or sixth inning without too much damage, we have a chance to make a good run because our bullpen has been as good as any in the country.”

Opponents are batting only .190 against relievers Dustin Quattrocchi (36 appearances, 1.83 ERA), Jordan Egan (1-1, 1.95), David Teasley (1-0, 1.96) and Ethan Cole (5-1, 2.14, 11 saves).

Kinney expects to send Esterlin Paulino (5-1, 2.56), who has made more starts (nine) than any Steamer, against Peninsula in Game 1 and Esteban Guzman (2-0, 1.17), a recent roster addition who has made only one start, in Game Two, which will be in Friday in Edenton.

For Game 3 (if necessary, also at Hicks Field) and beyond, the remaining starters will come from among a group likely to include Jordan Glover (5-1, 3.77), Jordan Moore (2-0, 3.19), Jonathan Sanchez (3-0, 2.50), Bennie Mejia (1-0, 8.16) and Brock Hudgens, who joined the team over the weekend after being an All-Star in the Southern Collegiate Baseball League.

“Our starters will have to throw strikes and we’ll have to play good defense,” said Kinney, well aware that the team’s ERA has climbed by nearly a run in the second half of the season even though the Steamers have won nearly 90 percent of their games in that stretch.

Hudgens provided a boost to the rotation against Outer Banks Tuesday, He threw fastballs that reached 92 mph while allowing three hits — including a two-run homer — and striking out seven in 5-1/3 innings.

“That was some job in his first game in front of 1,300 people,” Kinney said. “He’s definitely going to be one of the five who start a game in the playoffs.”

In Peninsula (27-29), the Steamers will be facing a team they have beaten in eight of 10 meetings this summer, including the last five.

While the Pilots have some players who can hit and a few good arms, the Steamers are confident that they can do what is necessary to move on to the Cup semifinals, which begin Monday.

“We’ve come this far, we might as well go all the way,” Cole said. “If we play hard the way we usually do, we’re going to be OK. I’ve never felt this good going into the playoffs on any team I ever played for.”

Steamers 11, Outer Banks 3: The Steamers tuned up an Outer Banks team (15-13 second half, 26-24) that was fighting for the last CPL playoff berth Tuesday.

The Daredevils came up short because Brock Hudgens, Dustin Quattrocchi, David Teasley and Ethan Cole limited them to five hits and the Steamers’ offense erupted for 13 hits.

Bo Bigham had three hits and drove in two runs, Ryan Brenner knocked in four runs with two hits and Joe Wendle and Tim Saunders both had two hits, including homers, to lead the Steamers. Brett Christopher also had two hits.

Wendle, who had been held hitless in his five previous games after batting nearly .500 over a 35-game span, broke out of his slump just in time. His home run and single enabled him to tie the Edenton record for highest batting average in a season (.377) and to hold off Zack Smith of Columbia in the race for the CPL single-season hits record.

Both Wendle and Smith started the night with 79 hits, but Smith went oh-for-3 in his finale.

The previous league record was 74 hits.