BRAVES player Manatu Crichton-Tunai rips a shot to centerfield in Minors semifinal action in The Dalles Little League playoffs. The Braves rebounded from a 5-2 deficit with seven unanswered runs and held on for a 9-5 win over the Rangers Tuesday.
BRAVES player Manatu Crichton-Tunai rips a shot to centerfield in Minors semifinal action in The Dalles Little League playoffs. The Braves rebounded from a 5-2 deficit with seven unanswered runs and held on for a 9-5 win over the Rangers Tuesday.
Coming off last season’s two suspenseful championship games, this Saturday figures to be just as dramatic as two teams from the Minors Division and two from the Majors class duke it out for the 2015 The Dalles Little League City Championship at Kramer Field in The Dalles.
At 9:30 a.m. Saturday on Field 1, the No. 1-seeded Braves take on the No. 3 D-Backs in a winner-take-all Minors title contest.
Wednesday, the D-Backs dropped the No. 2 Mariners in a 17-12 slugfest to punch their finals ticket.
With Manatu Crichton-Tunai, Styles DeLeon, Riley Brock and Quincy Townsend leading the way, the Braves battled back from an early 5-2 deficit with seven unanswered runs to eliminate the No. 5 Rangers 9-5 Tuesday to earn their finals bid.
In the Majors championship, the No. 1 Cardinals (14-4 overall) hit the diamond against the No. 2 Indians (9-9) at 1 p.m. Saturday with the winner hoisting gold.
Against the Angels (5-13) Tuesday in a semifinal game, Gaven Lutgens had an RBI single, and the duo of Tristan Bass and Gio Avilla both stole home on pass balls to score to give the Cards the early advantage.
In the third inning, Ben Schanno ripped an RBI double to score Colin Schubert, who led off with a double of his own.
The Cardinals, who boast the Majors Division’s best scoring offense with 196 runs scored in 18 games, wound up invoking the mercy rule in the bottom of the fourth inning after nine of their 11 players scored runs to cap a 14-4 triumph.
—
The Indians were successful in their championship game quest with an 8-3 win over the No. 3 Giants (8-10) Wednesday.
For the Giants, Austin Agidius hit a single to start things off and ended up stealing home to score the first run of the game.
In the third inning, Agidius scored again along with Gabe Petroff after being hit by a pitch and both scoring on passed balls.
The fifth inning saw the Giants using a two-out rally with the bases loaded.
Gabe Petroff (walk), Trenton Schacher (single) and Mike Armstrong (walk) had RBIs.
On the Indians’ side, Kade Wilson (walk) scored on a Carson Smith first-inning triple.
Smith later scored on a passed ball.
In the third inning, Jaxon Pullen and Wilson both hit singles.
After an error, Andru Weaver hit a two-run single to plate Pullen and Wilson.
Chase Sam drove in Weaver with a sharp double and he later scored on a passed ball.
The Indians capped their scoring in the fifth inning, as Chase Sam hit a two-out triple and then stole home for an insurance run.
—
Last season saw some competitive baseball games from four solid teams.
In what was a seesaw affair between two teams that did not want to give up without a fight, the Papa Murphy’s Pizza Marlins battled back from a 5-0 first-inning deficit and used a game-deciding throwing error that scored Jaxon Pullen and Steven Stanley in the bottom of the sixth inning to secure a 9-8 win over the White Sox in the Minors title game.
Colin McLoughlin picked up the win for the Marlins, as he lasted three innings and allowed three runs.
In the Majors game, Zach Anderson broke open a 5-2 lead with a grand slam in the bottom of the fourth inning and ace southpaw Caden Mathisen tossed a complete-game gem to lead the Nelson Tires Mariners to a 9-2 victory over the Hampton Furniture Cubs.
With the Mariners ahead 4-2 in the fourth inning, Mac Cope and Jorge Gutierrez received consecutive walks, and Ben Nelson was plunked to load the bases.
With bags still packed, Anderson hammered a 2-2 fastball 230-feet away over the left field fence for a grand slam to make it, 9-2.
Mathisen ran into a little trouble with two runners on base in the sixth inning, but he recorded a strikeout and then induced a game-ending popup.
After each title contest Saturday, the little league all-stars will be named.
Additional little league news can be found at www. eteamz.com/tdll.
Commented
Sorry, there are no recent results for popular commented articles.