Behind a one-hit effort by starter Chen Sheng-nan, Kaohsiung County’s Kao Yuan Senior High School trounced Chiayi’s County’s National Tung-Shih Senior High School in a 7-1 final in Sinjhuang on Friday for the right to face Taipei County’s Ku Pao Home Economics and Commercial High School in the title series.
The perennial powerhouse in high school baseball — whose impressive list of alumni includes Taiwan’s first major league pitcher Tsao Chin-hui and current ERA leader in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball, Chen Wei-yin — more than lived up to their nickname as the “Green Monsters” of the South by shutting down the National Tung-Shih attack all day long with Chen’s second one-hit effort in as many games.
Kao Yuan needed a little time getting to National Tung-Shih starter Wu Cheng-hsuan, with a pair of doubles and singles in the opening frame giving them a quick 3-0 advantage.
PHOTO: LO PEI-DER, TAIPEI TIMES
The lead left Chen more comfortable than ever. He approached the mound with tremendous confidence, shutting down National Tung-Shih’s offense with an assortment of pitches that kept the opposing hitters off-balance. Other than a single to National Tung-Shih captain Tsai Chih-yu in the bottom of the third that led to an unearned run, he was virtually unhittable.
After Wu Chen-hao’s RBI single off National Tung-Shih reliever Huang Pei-yuan made it 4-1 in the fourth, the Green Monsters tacked on two more runs in the sixth to blow the game wide open before scoring their final run of the contest in the ninth.
Five different hitters had multi-hit games for the victors, led by Kuo Jung-wei’s 4-for-5 performance, while Hsu Ji-hong batted a perfect 3-for-3 with a game-high four RBIs.
National Tung-Shih’s miraculous run this year finally ended after they upset defending champions Nan Ying Vocational High School earlier this week to reach the Elite Eight and defeated Pintung’s Mei Ho Senior High School to make their first ever Final Four appearance.
KU PAO 4,
CHUNG DAU 2
Ku Pao Home Economics and Commercial High School rumbled their way to a fourth straight title series appearance with a win over Yilan County’s Chung Dau Senior High School in Sinjhuang.
Starter Kuo Jung-hong took a 4-0 shutout two outs into the ninth with a three-hit beauty before giving up a triple and a single on top of a pair of walks that forced skipper Tsai Ming-tang to pull him out of the game.
Even though Chung Dau would rally for two runs in the bottom of the ninth to avoid a shutout, the deficit proved insurmountable as Ku Pao reliever Chen Pin-hsueh struck out the final Chung Dau batter, stranding the tying runner on first.
Kuo was credited with the win in what ended up being a five-hit outing, while his counterpart Kuo Bo-hen was tagged with the loss for allowing three runs on six hits over seven decent innings of play.
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