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Hurst gets 16th win for the Elephants

COURTESY CPBL

Jonathan Hurst led the Elephants to a tight 4-2 win over the Bulls in Hsinchuang Stadium last night.

Asked whether he would be pitching for a lead-topping 17th win in the final game of the season today, Hurst said, "I am not ruling it out. Let's see how the game goes tomorrow."

The Bulls scored their first run at the top of the first as Hurst walked the leadoff batter, Tseng Hua-wei, and gave up two hits. But the Elephants came right back with Lin Ming-shien's deep triple to the right to score one run.

The one-one tie was broken at the bottom of the second as the Elephants' Chen Rwei-chang belted his fourth home run of the season, scoring two runs to give the Elephants a 3-1 lead. With two more hits in the fifth inning, the Elephants scored a fourth run to lead the Bulls with the score of 4-1.

The Bulls' batting lineup was quiet against Hurst's pitching. Hurst gave up only five scattered hits in his eight-inning outing, striking out five Bulls' batters to register his 16th win of the season. He is now tied with Sung Chao-chee of the Whales.

The Bulls' Huang Chung-yee failed to get any hits in last night's game, reducing his batting average to 0.331. Chen Chien-wei leads the batting averages with 0.334. Both Huang and Chen will be at-bat today for the last time this season, with Huang needing at least three hits out of four at-bats to take over the lead.

In Kaohsiung the Lions defeated the Whales 11-2. The Lions' Huang Kan-lin took his tally of stolen bases to 41, nine more than second-placed Chen Chih-yuen.

Today is the last day of the regular season. The Bulls will meet the Elephants in Hsinchuang Stadium and the Whales play the Lions in Kaohsiung.

The 2002 CPBL playoff will start on Oct. 12 in Tienmu Stadium, with the Elephants hosting the Whales in Game One.

BY PAUL HUANG, CONTRIBUTING REPORTER

After Tuesday night's scoring-fest, in which the Taipei Gida and Kaohsiung Fala combined to score 18 runs, last night's match was more of a pitching duel.

The Fala won Game Two of the first playoff series on first baseman Pan Chung-wei's line drive single to the right in the last at-bat for the 2-1 victory.

Gida starter Liang Rue-hao took a perfect game into the sixth. Fala left fielder Huang Long-yi drove a fastball from Liang to shallow center for the Fala's first run of the game and a 1-0 lead.

The Gida came right back in the following inning by scoring a run of their own with pinch hitter Lin Chih-wei's clutch single off Fala reliever Kasey Olenberger.

The final inning started with a double by Fala center fielder Yin Ming-tsun off Gida starter Liang. One sacrifice bunt and an intentional walk later, Liang managed to strikeout Fala third baseman Kuo Chan-ting for the second out of the inning to set the stage for the showdown between him and Fala first baseman Pan Chung-wei. Pan promptly delivered the game-winner and possibly the series-saver. A Gida victory would have put the Fala down two games to none heading into tonight's Game Three in Kaohsiung, a potential series-clincher.
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