A tough loss to Japan on Saturday didn’t keep Taiwan’s Fu-Hsing Little League team from battering Pearland, Texas, 14-2 in the consolation game on Sunday.
The team from Kaohsiung came out swinging and stunned Texas with nine quick runs in the top of the first inning to create a deficit from which the Texans never recovered.
At a press conference after the game was ended on the mercy rule, reporters asked Fu-Hsing’s players why their performance seemed so much better than in the previous day’s 3-2 loss to Japan. Several of the players reportedly answered straightforwardly — Japan are much stronger than Texas.
PHOTO: AFP
Shih Shun-hao started the game with a three-run homer and after the big first inning, Taiwan went on to score a run in the second and three more in the third.
Texas managed to tally two points in the bottom of the third, but Taiwan added another nail in the coffin in the top of the fourth and held off Texas in the second half of the inning for the mercy-rule win.
“Yesterday [Saturday] we made a lot of mistakes we shouldn’t have made, but today we avoided a lot of mistakes we could have made,” Shih said.
“Scenes from the game against Japan kept coming back to me in my dreams,” said Hung Chun-yi, the team’s captain.
In the final, the Little League aces from Japan ended the US’ five-year reign as World Series champions.
JAPAN WIN TITLE
Tokyo limited Waipahu, Hawaii, to four singles and got a homer and three RBIs from Konan Tomori to take the Little League World Series title with a 4-1 victory.
For the first time since 2003, a team from Japan is flying home with the championship banner.
Hawaii, who had scored 29 runs over their previous three games, came up short at the plate against Tokyo.
Hawaii’s only run came on an error off a sacrifice bunt in the fourth, but reliever Ichiro Ogasawara worked out of a second-and-third jam with a strikeout and a weak bouncer.
Ryusuke Ikeda got the win after striking out five and allowing four hits over three innings, before Ogasawara pitched the final three, striking out three to get his third save.
Fittingly, Japan’s players gravitated to the mound after the game to scoop up bags of dirt to take home as mementos, as family members watched proudly from the first-base stands.
After exchanging handshakes at the plate with Hawaii, Japan also got another souvenir — a banner that read “2010 Little League World Series Champions.”
They finished the tournament with a perfect 5-0 record.
Cheered on by Hawaii fans waving US flags and tea leaves they’ve been carrying around for good luck, the Waipahu All-Stars put on a valiant effort on the mound and with the glove.
Thirteen-year-old lefty starter Cody Maltezo, who hadn’t pitched in roughly a month, held Japan to four hits over five-and-two-third innings, while Noah Shackles’ fine stop of a hard bouncer at third base likely saved two runs in the third, but the mashers from the West couldn’t get the clutch hits that had propelled their unlikely run of four victories in four elimination games over four days.
So the All-Star team from Tokyo’s Edogawa Minami Little League became the first international team to take the crown since Curacao in 2004. A team from Tokyo’s Musashi-Fuchu Little League were the last winners from Japan, the previous year.
Natsuki Mizumachi took a few steps to his right and dropped to his knees to rob Kahoea Akau of a hit to center in the fifth inning.
Twelve-year-old second baseman Koutaro Kamikura followed that up with a nice stop to his right of a hard bouncer by Ty DeSa to save another hit.
The 12-year-old Tomori tacked on two insurance runs in the sixth with his opposite-field shot to right.
Chants of “USA! USA!” echoed through Lamade Stadium after Shackles reached on an error with one out in the sixth inning, but Ogasawara got a strikeout for the second out and Teruma Nagata happily jogged in from right when he caught the final out.
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