Team Bahamas finally had reason to celebrate at the World Baseball Challenge.
Heading into Tuesday afternoon's game at Citizen Field against the Beijing Tigers, the Bahamas had gone winless at the WBC. The club from the Caribbean island nation posted a 0-7 record in 2009 and lost its first three contests this year by a combined score of 36-8.
All that frustration ended against the Tigers. The Bahamas, with a pair of three-run home runs, edged the Tigers 6-5 by way of a comeback.
The key innings for the Bahamas were the bottom of the fourth and bottom of the eighth.
In the fourth, Sherman Ferguson provided the big blow. His two-out homer came with teammates Brandon Murray and Theodore Trae Sweeting Jr. on the basepaths. Murray, the first batter of the inning, was hit by a pitch from Mao Lei, while Sweeting was aboard on a fielder's choice.
In the eighth, Murray launched his own three-run shot. Prior to his at-bat against Yang Haifan, leadoff batters Nathan Smith and Desmond Russell rapped out back-to-back singles.
Going into the bottom of the eighth, the Bahamas trailed 5-3. The Tigers scored a single run in the top of the fourth and put up two in each of the fifth and sixth innings.
Ronald Pena, who relieved starter Jonathan Groezinger after the fourth inning, was the winning pitcher. Combined, Groezinger and Pena gave up just six hits.
Yang took the loss for the Tigers.
With the result, the Bahamas moved to 1-3 and the Tigers dropped to a surprising 0-4.
The Bahamas is off today, while the Tigers will try to find the win column when they face Chinese Taipei at 3 p.m.
Chinese Taipei 8 Toshiba Japan 2
Powered by a four-run sixth inning, Chinese Taipei beat Toshiba Japan 8-2 in Tuesday's second game at the WBC.
In the top of the sixth, Chinese Taipei's Chun Chieh Wang connected for the key hit, a two-run double that came on the heels of an RBI single by Wei Ting Lin. Later, Po Ting Hsiao cracked out another RBI single. All the hits came at the expense of Toshiba Japan pitcher Kazuo Kido, who had replaced Hayato Arakaki after Arakaki hit the first Chinese Taipei batter, Chih Pei Huang.
Chinese Taipei also sent two runners across home plate in the fifth inning and scored single runs in the seventh and eighth innings. Tsung Han Yu (top of the fifth) and Kuan Wei Yang (top of the seventh) smacked leadoff home runs for the winners.
The lone runs for Toshiba Japan came in the third and fourth innings.
Chinese Taipei, a true national team, had 17 hits, compared to eight for Toshiba Japan, a club team.
Chun Lin Kuo, who was on the hill for eight solid innings, was the winning pitcher. Arakaki took the loss.
Chinese Taipei improved its record to 2-1 and Toshiba Japan slipped to 2-2.
Chinese Taipei will meet the Beijing Tigers today at 3 p.m. At 7 p.m., Japan will swing against Team Canada.
