The CNMI Junior National Baseball Team went winless in the first round of competition of the 2012 18 & Under Oceania AAA Championship, but finally hit pay dirt when the second leg of the double-round robin got going Monday.<\/p>\n
After enduring a 2-8 loss to host team Guam on Sunday night, the CNMI finally entered the win column the next day thanks to a 4-2 victory over New Zealand (2-2) as action continued at Paseo Stadium,in Agana, Guam.<\/p>\n
The win improved the Commonwealth\u2019s win-loss slate to 1-3 with two games yet to play.<\/p>\n
The CNMI faced top-ranked Australia in a home draw yesterday. Results were not available as of press time. Australia came into Monday night\u2019s match against Guam undefeated in three games.<\/p>\n
[B]CNMI 4, New Zealand 2[\/B]<\/p>\n
After two scoreless innings, the CNMI took a 4-0 lead in the third inning off a three-RBI double by Leroy Regis. He scored later off a wild throw.<\/p>\n
New Zealand answered with a run in the bottom frame and added another run later in its final stand, but the CNMI held strong for the win.<\/p>\n
Regis batted 1-for-3 and touched base twice in the match.<\/p>\n
Other notables include a double by Ricardo Dela Cruz, who batted 2-for-3 in the game.<\/p>\n
Regis led the CNMI both at the plate and on the mound.<\/p>\n
The CNMI starting pitcher was awarded the win with just two strikeouts in the game. <\/p>\n
He faced 31 batters before teammate Henry Rabauliman was tapped to close the game. <\/p>\n
Regis managed five groundouts with eight fly outs on 113 pitches, 63 of which being called for a strike, and plunked two batters.<\/p>\n
As a team, the CNMI smashed five hits, and although they gave up a handful of errors out in the field no hits were credited to their opponents.<\/p>\n
[B]Guam 8, CNMI 2[\/B]<\/p>\n
Back on Sunday, Guam struck first with a run in the second inning and then jumped in front, 4-0, in the top of the fourth.<\/p>\n
The CNMI managed to get a run back in the bottom frame, but Guam exploded again with three runs in the fifth inning, shifting the count to 7-1.<\/p>\n
The CNMI mustered a run in the bottom of the sixth, but Guam got it back in the bottom of the seventh and shut the CNMI down in the final stand.<\/p>\n
In the game, the CNMI was held to just three hits at the plate, one of which was an RBI triple by Regis. He went on to bat 2-for-3 and stole a base but also hit into a double play. <\/p>\n
Most of the CNMI\u2019s base runners reached on errors, but Guam did a good job minimizing the damage.<\/p>\n
Guam racked up nine hits in the match. Kin Fernandez Jr. led the U.S. territory\u2019s offense with three hits for four RBIs, while teammate Justin Elm swung 2-for-3 with an RBI. Jonathan Mayo scored two runs with an RBI single.<\/p>\n
Guam\u2019s Nicolas Cruz pitched a complete game in just 93 pitches with seven strikeouts. The CNMI went through four pitchers in the ordeal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The CNMI Junior National Baseball Team went winless in the first round of competition of the 2012 18 & Under Oceania AAA Championship, but finally hit pay dirt when the second leg of the double-round robin got going Monday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-158561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158561\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}