Samantha Finlay's one-out single with the bases loaded in the bottom of the eighth scored the winning runs for Team USA as it rallied from a 3-2 deficit to beat Team Taiwan by a final of 4-3 in the title game of the 2006 World University Softball Championship at Tainan yesterday afternoon.
The ladies from the US successfully defending their title from 2004 with a valiant effort that included two comebacks in a hard fought match before clinching the title in extra-innings against the previously-unbeaten Taiwanese.
The highly anticipated showdown between the top two squads in this year's competition was every bit as exciting as it had been billed to be, with the staff ace for each team, Jennifer Ritter (USA) and Chueh Ming-hui (Taiwan), taking the mound in search of the victory.
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE CTUSF
After a scoreless first two innings in which Taiwan wasted a golden scoring opportunity with two on and no outs in the top of the first, Team USA was able to strike first with a lining double to left by Lindsay Schutzler that scored the game's first run in the bottom of the third.
Trailing 1-0, Tung Yun-chi led off the Taiwan fourth with a single to left before being replaced by pinch runner Lin Hsiu-min, who would score one out later on an RBI single by Chen Po-Lung.
Another run also crossed the plate on the same play as the right-fielder for Team USA's throw to home was mishandled by the catcher to make it 2-1 in favor of the home team.
Taiwan's lead would last for less than two innings as the US answered with a run of their own in the bottom of the fifth on Schutzler's run-scoring single off right-hander Lai Sheng-Jung, who entered the game earlier in the inning as relief for Wu Chia-yen.
Lauren Lappin's one-out single in the bottom of the seventh, followed by a fielding error by pitcher Lai Sheng-Jung on the ensuing sacrifice bunt attempt and Christina Boutelle's infield single had Team USA threatening with the bases loaded.
But a re-entering Chueh Ming-hui (who started the game and left in the fourth), managed to induce a fly-out to shallow-right against Brianne McGowan for the second out of the inning before right-fielder Lai Meng-ting gunned down the runner at the home plate to end the US seventh, setting the stage for the late-game drama
"It took a total team effort for us to win the game," US head coach Carol Hutchins said after the game.
Picking up her second win of the day (she was also the winning pitcher in the game against Japan earlier yesterday) was Ritter.
The right-hander out of the University of Michigan allowed three runs (only one earned) on five singles while fanning four and walking two.
The five errors committed by her defense nearly cost Ritter the win, but in the end, it all worked out.
Taking the disheartening loss for the home team was Chueh, who could not escape her second base-loaded jam of the game as she surrendered the game-winning hit to Finlay on a clean shot to left.
Japan 2, USA 3
It was Samantha Finlay's liner to left off Japan's Makiko Fujiwara in the eighth that earned Team USA a 3-2 win and the right to play Taiwan in the title game earlier yesterday.
The Americans also drew first blood in this game with Christina Boutelle's one-run single off Japanese starter Fujiwara in the bottom of the third for a 1-0 lead, only to find themselves behind by a run in the fourth when a past ball by the American catcher coupled with a one-run single by Kaoru Oyanagi secured two quick runs for Japan.
Kristie Fox's hard double to left would force a 2-all tie in the bottom of the fourth, where the score stayed deadlocked until Finlay's game-winner.
Final Standings
1st: USA, 2nd: Taiwan, 3rd: Japan,
4th: Australia, 5th: Thailand,
6th: South Africa
When Paddy Dwyer arrived in China in 1976, crowds jostled to catch a glimpse of him and his companions — the first Western soccer team to play in the country. China was emerging from the chaos of the Cultural Revolution, and on the brink of market reforms that would take the country from economic stagnation to explosive growth. “All we could see was lines of people running beside our bus, trying to look in the windows, to see their first visual of a white person,” he said. “It was all bicycles,” he said. “There were very few cars to be seen.” Dwyer,
A new NZ$683 million (US$404 million) stadium that was a symbol of Christchurch’s struggle to rebuild after a deadly earthquake struck the New Zealand city is to host its first match tomorrow in front of a sellout crowd. A magnitude 6.2 earthquake killed 185 people in February 2011 and toppled or damaged buildings, including the city’s old Lancaster Park. The stadium, which hosted international rugby and cricket, and was home to the Canterbury Crusaders, was badly damaged and never reopened. It was bulldozed in 2019 and turned into sports fields, leaving the Crusaders without a permanent home. Government funding for a new stadium was
Some of Clearlake Capital Group’s largest investors are growing increasingly concerned about how much time the company’s co-founders are spending on sports investments as they have struggled to complete the fundraising for the private equity firm’s latest flagship fund. One of Clearlake’s co-founders, Behdad Eghbali, has been spending what some investors described as a disproportionate amount of time on the firm’s investment in Chelsea Football Club in recent months. Now, co-founder Jose E. Feliciano and his wife, Kwanza Jones, are nearing a record US$3.9 billion deal to acquire the San Diego Padres. That personal investment by Feliciano has set off the latest
The Philadelphia Flyers and the Pittsburg Penguins on Wednesday put a squeeze on the penalty box in Game 3 of their NHL playoff series — with 11 players cramped inside their designated punishment areas. Each could have snapped a team photo after a melee broke out in the second period of the Flyers’ 5-2 win over the Penguins in their Eastern Conference first-round series. “It was a party in there,” penalized Flyers defenseman Nick Seeler said. The celebration extended into the joyous locker room after the Flyers took a 3-0 series lead. Penguins forward Bryan Rust slammed Travis Konecny to the ice behind the
RSS