Taipei Dong Yuan Elementary School on Wednesday defeated Cardenales Little League of Barquisimeto, Venezuela, to remain undefeated and send Taiwan to the Little League World Series International Championship game for the 20th time and the fourth consecutive year in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
Representing Asia-Pacific, after powering past South Korea 2-0 last month, Dong Yuan toppled the Latin American regional champions 7-3, handing Venezuela their first loss.
The tournament uses a double-elimination format, giving Venezuela a second chance.
Photo: AP
The Cardenales last night after press time were to play Aruba, the Caribbean champions, for a shot at facing Dong Yuan in the semi-finals tomorrow. The winner of that game would go on to play the US team in the World Series Championship on Sunday.
Half of the teams in the annual tournament in Pennsylvania come from regions across the US, while the rest are the winners of international regional championships.
Aruba stayed alive by knocking Tokyo’s Joto Little League out of the tournament with a 3-0 victory.
Photo: AP
Dong Yuan, who earned their first tournament berth in a decade in the Asia-Pacific tournament in South Korea, won their only World Series title in 1972.
Wednesday’s game was a battle of the international star teams, fueled by deep pitching rosters, even though both teams’ star throwers were missing.
On Monday, Taiwan blanked Aruba 4-0, with Liu Wei-heng throwing 11 strikeouts in 4-2/3 innings.
The single-game record at the Little League World Series is 22 strikeouts, set by Taiwan’s Hsu Chin-mu in August 1971.
However, Liu did not pitch on Wednesday, when Lin Chin-tse, Chang Chun-po and Chen Qi-sheng led Taiwan over Venezuela, who were unable to field Juan Reyes, Cardenales’ star pitcher, who was ineligible after throwing 77 pitches.
Reyes on Monday helped Venezuela become the first team since 2021 to blank their first three opponents, including the Japanese powerhouse Joto. Reyes struck out nine players in their 4-0 shutout of Japan. The pitcher was expected to return for last night’s game against Aruba.
Dong Yuan took an early lead on Wednesday in the first international game of the day, scoring twice on bases-loaded walks with two outs in the first inning against Venezuela’s Andres Reyes, who earlier in the tournament racked up seven strikeouts.
Before the end of the first inning, Andres Reyes had already been pulled, while starter Lin struck out Cardenales’ first three batters.
Lin had six strikeouts before he gave over the mound to Chang in the third.
Taiwan extended their lead in the fourth to 3-0, while Chang closed out the inning with two strikeouts, before Chen came in.
However, before throwing any pitches, Chen ripped a three-RBI double to left field in the top of the fifth, propelling Dong Yuan to a 7-0 lead. Venezuela answered with three runs in the bottom half, but it was not enough.
Chen, who had two hits and a walk, struck out two batters over the final 1-2/3 innings.
Teams from Taiwan have won 17 titles at the Little League World Series, second to the US, with their last one dating back to 1996, when Hsieh Chin-hsiung set the record for most home runs, at seven; most runs, at 13; and most RBIs at 16.
Hsieh had broken the six homer record set by Taiwan’s Lin Chih-hsiang, who had beat out the five-run record set by Lin Wen-hsiung in 1974.
After Monday’s game, Dong Yuan manager Lai Min-nan praised the team’s pitchers.
“I want to maximize each player, either the curveball or the fastball,” Lai said. “I allocate different pitchers depending on the opponent.”
Lin Chin-tse, who pitched in Taiwan’s 3-0 win over Mexico on Thursday last week, can throw at 129kph. He faced one batter in Monday’s game and struck him out — with bases loaded.
“I’ve been very satisfied with our pitching staff,” Lai said. “This is probably the most complete pitching staff I’ve had.”
Wilyer Abreu watched the ball leave the park and tossed his bat high in the air. His Venezuela teammates streamed out of the dugout in celebration. The comeback was on and the win over the reigning World Baseball Classic (WBC) champion Japan was within reach. Japan, their 11-game WBC winning streak on the line, held a 5-4 lead in the sixth inning of Saturday’s thrilling quarter-final matchup when Abreu put his team ahead with the biggest swing of the game: a three-run shot off Hiromi Itoh that sent the loanDepot Park crowd into a passionate roar and helped seize Venezuela’s 8-5
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