Three Asian teams are following Team USA into the semi-finals at the World University Baseball Championship in the Czech Republic. Japan and Korea won their last preliminary games on Thursday and finished in second and third in the standings. Taiwan lost 2-3 against the USA, but profited from the defeat by Canada to stay in fourth place. The Czech and the Lithuanian squads land in sixth and seventh.
Team USA needed a walk off homerun by Hunter Morris in the bottom of the eleventh to beat Taiwan 3-2 and to extend their winning streak to 22 games. A period before they could already have won it on a walk off homer, but right fielder Mis-Szu Chen robbed Blake Smith with a catch above the wall. The Asians had tied the contest in the top of the eighth on RBI singles by Te-Lung Siun and Chih-Hsiang Lin. Mike Leake allowed just one hit in six innings in his start. Tyler Lyons picked up the win. Ko-Chien Lin took the loss after giving up just one hit in four-plus innings of relief.
In the afternoon Korea nearly blew a 5-0 lead in a 5-4 win against Canada. They opened the scoring in the second, when they plated four runs, highlighted by a two-run triple by Jin Ho Jung. They added an insurance run in the fifth and everybody expected an easy victory. However the maple leafs tried to come back. They loaded the bases in the eighth and Grant Kveder got Canada within a run, hitting a three-run-double and scoring on a sac fly by Eric Cattoni. But they could not get anything going afterwards. Yo Kang Heo allowed two hits and three walks in 6 1/3 innings to receive the win. Simon Thain gave up five runs (4 ER) on six hits to take the loss.
In the evening Japan used a six-run ninth to crush host Czech Republic 10-1. The Asian team had started the match with three runs in the top of the first and controlled the Czech offense with good pitching afterwards. With their big inning in the end they put the game out of reach for the home team. Takuya Tsukuura hit a three-run homerun and drove in four. Noriharu Yamazaki got two RBI. The Czech team managed just one hit in the game and scored their lone run on a sac fly by Jakub Malik. Toshiki Tsuboi gave up one hit, one run and three walks in five innings for the win. Boris Bokaj took the loss after giving up six hits, four runs and two walks in four innings.
Results:
TAI 000 000 020 00 2 4 1 USA 000 011 000 01 3 4 1
Box score
Recap on usabaseball.com
KOR 040 010 000 5 6 2 CAN 000 000 040 4 5 2
JPN 300 100 006 10 13 0 CZE 100 000 000 1 1 3
Standings:
- USA 6-0
- Japan 5-1
- Korea 4-2
- Taiwan 3-3
- Canada 2-4
- Czech Republic 1-5
- Lithuania 0-6
Semi-Finals:
Saturday July 26 in Brno:
10:00 USA – Taiwan
18:00 Japan – Korea