NATCHEZ &045; The way Scott Turner started to blossom on the mound, why mess with a good thing?

The hard-throwing left-hander was just the man the Natchez 11-year-old All-Stars wanted Saturday night, and everything worked out well in their 4-2 win over Laurel in the opening night of the 11-year-old state tournament at Duncan Park.

More important, it secured a sense of confidence for a Natchez team that &045; as the host team of the state tournament &045; had the automatic bid to state locked up and didn’t go through a sub-district or district tournament.

Now they’ll play at 7 p.m. Monday against the winner of today’s Petal-McComb game.

&uot;That is the most important thing,&uot; Natchez assistant Chris Dunaway said. &uot;We thought they brought some good intensity, we had some good defensive play and pretty much made them earn what they got.&uot;

Turner finished the game with nine strikeouts and pitched a one-hitter against Laurel, who managed to threaten in the last inning with a runner on third base with two outs. Cory Kitchens walked, stole second and went to third when the throw went into center field to give his club life near the end of the game.

Turner, though, got Ben Willis to ground out back to the mound to end the game.

&uot;He’s just got a fastball, throws a little offspeed and he’s got a little cutter we’re working on,&uot; Dunaway said. &uot;I thought he did a real good job for us. He pitched real strong for us.&uot;

The complete game prevented Turner from coming back Monday night to pitch, and it cut into his 13-inning tournament limit a bit. But coaches wanted to go at least three &045; a pitcher who throws four or more innings must sit out the next game &045; and see how it went.

Through three innings, Turner hadn’t allowed a hit and struck out four.

&uot;When you’ve got a pitcher that’s on, you’ve got to go with him,&uot; assistant Brian Hammons said.

Natchez didn’t need all the offense against Laurel pitches with Turner on the mound, and the Laurel pitchers tried their best to return the favor by allowing only five hits after the first inning.

Laurel scored two in the fourth to make things interesting, but Natchez answered with a run in the bottom half to maintain the momentum.

&uot;We’ll have a little batting practice tomorrow, come out and watch some baseball tomorrow night and play Monday night,&uot; head coach Boo Brumfield said. &uot;We had a couple of baserunning mistakes, but we’ll work on that.&uot;

Turner was touched for two runs in the fourth as Laurel’s Paul Aehnlichk slapped a double to the fence in left center that scored Hunter Estess and Deion Ulmer that cut the lead to 3-2. But Turner got the next batter to strike out to end the inning.

Aehnlichk’s double was Laurel’s only hit of the game.

Natchez got the big hits in the first inning with a three-run lead right off the bat. Daniel Dunaway singled and went to third on an error on a ball hit by Christopher Perry, and both scored when Collin Hammons put a shot to the fence for a double.

Daniel Huffines followed that up later with a triple that scored Hammons for the 3-0 lead.

Give credit to Laurel pitchers Steven Billingsley and Deion Ulmer, however, for settling down after that. Laurel’s defense also came through behind them with a double play in the fourth inning that could have turned into something big for Natchez.

Hammons grounded out to short for the first out of the inning, and Koby Sheppard fired to Darius Dace to punch out Perry after he tried to move over from second.