by Dave Delgado
Guam - The Team Guam Baseball All-Stars took to the field against CNMI this morning behind starting pitcher Magalahi Salas who sat down a couple of batters early in the ballgame. Salas worked the strike zone and kept Team Guam in the game, as neither side would score a run through 3 innings of play.
Defense was the key for both sides with the outfielders coming up with grabs and the guys in the infield getting hitters to ground out. CNMI would strike first getting a runner on off a base hit and bringing 2 in off a triple and throwing error by Team Guam.
CNMI would later add 2 more scores and take a 4-0 lead heading into the top of the 6th when the rain started to pour. After a half-hour delay, Team Guam rallied to tie the game at 4 piece thanks to Xavier Reyes who ripped a 2-run homer to keep Guam alive. The game went into extra innings with CNMI and Guam fighting to take the lead in the 8th. With no score the two teams took the game into the 9th where pitcher Carl Jaminilla stepped to the plate and got a hold of the pitch and sent it over the center field fence for a 3-run homer.
Guam added another security run to go up 8-4 heading into the bottom of the 9th. CNMI scored one last run but fell 8-5, Guam moved on to play Chinese Taipei 15 minutes later in the playoffs for a chance to go to the championship game.
