NATCHEZ – The Franklin County All-Stars handed Columbus a 5-3loss in the opening round of the Dixie Youth Baseball AAA StateTournament at Duncan Park early Sunday morning. Saturday night’sgame finished around 1 a.m. Sunday. Franklin County was scheduledto meet defending state champ Hattiesburg Sunday afternoon. Theresults were unavailable at press time.

Powering Franklin at the plate with two singles apiece wereJarvis King, John Paul Sullivan and Robert Wilson. Percy Camerondoubled to score three runs. Singling were Matthew Lofton andDonnie McFarland.

The winning pitcher in relief was Matthew Lofton who worked thethird and fourth innings. Lofton fanned one batter and walked two.Starting the first two innings was Cable McMinn with fourstrikeouts and four walks. Working the final two innings with fivestrikeouts and no walks was Ryan Ratcliff.

Brake Gregory went the distance in the loss, striking out fiveand walking four.

Sullivan scored the tying run for Franklin County in the secondinning off a wild pitch. Cameron’s 3RBI double put Franklin ahead4-3 in the bottom of the fourth inning, Cameron scored the fifthrun.

“The middle and bottom of our lineup hit very well,” said CoachLance Murray. “If we can get all of our lineup hitting well, weought to have a pretty good chance of winning it.”

FRANKLIN CO. 5, COLUMBUS 3

Columbus 100 300 – 3 3 1

Franklin Co. 010 400 – 5 9 1

WP – McMinn. LP -Gregory.