[03/01/02]Jeremy Ferguson threw a perfect game as Warren Central knocked off Natchez in five innings, 11-0, Thursday night.

The junior right-hander had only four strikeouts, but he didn’t walk anyone and the defense behind him was tight, not allowing any baserunners before the game was shortened by the 10-run mercy rule.

“It just shows that if you throw strikes, you’ve got a chance,” WC coach Randy Broome said. “He was all over the plate.

“He’s not going to blow the ball by anybody, but he throws strikes. The infielders and outfielders were on their toes, so good things happened for him.”

The Vikings (7-1) cranked out 10 hits and responded to Broome’s “pep talk” in the third inning of the game, which was moved up to 5 p.m., instead of 7 to try to beat the cold.

He told them there would be “consequences” if they didn’t start coming up with hits with runners on base.

“We’ve been leaving too many on,” Broome said. “We’ve got too many good hitters for that to be happening. We just had to get focused.”

Apparently, extra running in practice didn’t appeal to the Vikings, because they responded with a six-run outburst in the fourth inning to go up, 10-0.

Joey Lieberman had two doubles and three RBIs and John Morgan Mims went 2-for-3 with an RBI double and reached base all four times. Carl Upton had a two-RBI double, Brian Pettway had an RBI double and Jeff Mitchell doubled.

Ferguson also had a pair of RBIs.

Broome said that Ferguson handled three sharp comebackers and the last out ricocheted off his foot to Lieberman, who had also made an earlier nice play at shortstop to keep the perfect game going.

“It was like it was meant to be,” Broom said.