FERRIDAY, La. &045; Erin Hedrick can now concentrate on the mitt, rock and fire.

It hasn’t always been that easy this season. The Huntington senior might not have admitted at the time, but she was literally carrying a young team on her back at the start of the season and was forced to do everything she could from hitters putting one in the outfield.

Not any more.

The Lady Hounds’ defense continues to improve with each game, and it came in handy Tuesday. Hedrick tossed a no-hitter while striking out 14 as the Lady Hounds put away Prairie View 6-0 with the South State tournament set to start Saturday.

&uot;I felt like I went out there to do a job,&uot; said Hedrick, who pitched three one-hitters at the Glenbrook tournament Saturday. &uot;But now I feel confident with everybody behind me catching the ball. Everybody has come so far this season. I was always worried about it, but it’s turned out for the best.

&uot;Everybody runs on the field with confidence. They’re excited about it. They’ve given me a good last year.&uot;

Give credit to coaches Rut Horne and Robert Ogden along with a scrappy bunch of underclassmen who were committed to improving. Fly balls aren’t falling in like they were at the beginning of the season, and the young infield &045; two freshmen and an eighth-grader at shortstop &045; are making the plays.

One ball fell in Tuesday when a shot by Prairie View cleanup hitter Lindsay Cheek to left fell in for an error. Hedrick, however, got into a zone after that by retiring 14 straight batters and getting the last seven hitters of the game to strike out.

&uot;Good pitching makes the rest of your team look really good,&uot; Horne said. &uot;(Shortstop) Julie Moak made some plays. When we play them, we always have a bad inning. They’re a double-A school, and we’re a single-A. But we can play with them.

&uot;The last two innings, all of it was riseballs for strikeouts. Once we got two strikes on them, the riseball put them away.&uot;

Hedrick was able to work in a revamped changeup on Tuesday, and that &045; combined with her normal riseball and drop pitches &045; were enough to keep only that one ball from leaving the outfield the entire game.

The Lady Spartans put the ball in play just three times in the last four innings.

&uot;Her changeup was working,&uot; PVA head coach Tab Musgrove said. &uot;We were just too eager for it and were jumping on it. We’ve seen her before and knew what she had. We tried to prepare for it, but we weren’t able to prepare for that changeup. She changed speeds on us a good bit, and we just couldn’t do anything with it.&uot;

The changeup is now a formidable pitch for a right-hander who has enough pitches that are tough to hit. The only trouble Hedrick got into for the game came in the second with the error before she issued her only walk of the game.

But she was able to throw Cheek out at the plate for the first out and get the next two batters on strikeouts to end the inning.

&uot;I had taught her last summer a reverse-spin changeup, and my son came out and was watching her,&uot; Horne said. &uot;He didn’t like the way it looked. He taught her to throw a palm-drop changeup from the palm of her hand. It’s worked real well. That’s why her K’s have gone up.&uot;

Hedrick’s counterpart, Cheek, didn’t throw all that bad as she allowed just three hits while walking none. But Cheek didn’t fare nearly as well with her supporting cast as the Lady Spartans had seven errors behind her.

Cheek also hit three batters, and the Lady Hounds got most of their runs on aggressive baserunning and bunts.

&uot;We do better against a pitcher with a little better control,&uot; Horne said. &uot;Her pitches were high, and we swung at some bad pitches. When we started the season, we had four girls who could bunt. Now we have 12. We didn’t always get hits, but we moved runners. The bottom of our lineup are not good hitters, but they’re good bunters.&uot;

Leslie Wagoner, Sarah Loomis and Megan Wilkinson scored in the second inning thanks to a Loomis bunt single and a Wilkinson hit.

In the third the Lady Hounds got two runs when Krystal Arnold was hit by a pitch, Brandy Butts reached on an error and both scored on an error on a hit by Wagoner.

&uot;This was a good game to have before (South State),&uot; Hedrick said. &uot;At the beginning of the year we couldn’t field a ball. It’s been a lot of hard, hard work. Everybody has been dedicated and wanting to get better. I’m positive about it.&uot;