Oklahoma slips past Belgium in 9 innings

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BANGOR – After blowouts ruled day one of the Senior League World Series, fans were treated to a Tuesday morning pitchers’ duel that was just as good as Mansfield Stadium’s famous Ballpark Brownie Sundae.

Between the three of them, pitchers Jeff Comfort and Jon Reed of Southwest representative Tulsa, Okla., and Europe-Middle East-Africa’s Masanori Nagashima of Brussels, Belgium, delivered a delectable treat themselves.

Tulsa reached Nagashima, who pitched 8 1/3 strong innings, for two runs in the top of the ninth to earn a 6-4 extra-inning victory in a Pool B matchup.

Brussels falls to 0-2 in the tournament while Tulsa was playing its first game.

Reed, primarily a starter, pitched three strong innings in relief to earn the win. Reed primarily used his fastball to get hitters out.

“I didn’t really try and throw the curveball because they weren’t hitting the fastball,” said Reed, who allowed no runs and no hits while striking out eight and walking only one.

“He’s one of those guys, sometimes it takes an inning or two for him to get warmed up,” Southwest manager Jeff Chism said. “He came in and threw strikes.”

Reed’s offense finally gave him a lead in the top of the ninth. Bob Galbraith struck out to open the inning but took first base after the ball got away from EMEA catcher Richard Conway.

After taking second base on a defensive indifference and stealing third, Galbraith scored on a wild pitch, which proved to be the game-winning run.

Comfort added some insurance with an RBI single to make it 6-4.

From there, Reed took care of the rest, striking out the side in the bottom of the inning, working around an infield error which allowed pinch hitter Moe Miller to reach.

“You’ve got to give the Southwest team credit, they played wonderful,” EMEA manager Michael Steege said.

In the bottom of the sixth, it appeared EMEA was on its way to an upset after Sean Lyke doubled home a run to give Brussels a 4-3 lead heading into the top of the seventh.

That’s when things got interesting.

Southwest pinch hitter Andrew Maner looped a single into no-man’s-land in short right field, then Kevin Mantle came in to pinch run.

Mantle, who is baseball legend Mickey Mantle’s great-nephew, took second on Josh Way’s infield hit, third on a wild pitch, and scored on a sacrifice fly by Mark Robinette.

So on this day, at least, the baseball gods were smiling down on the boys from the Sooner State.

“He was really hustling around. He did a good job getting around, [scoring] that [tying] run,” Chism said.

Nagashima, a lefty, did give Tulsa trouble with his nasty curveball and excellent change-up.

“Lefthanders tend to give us problems at times, and he was moving the ball around very well,” Chism said. “We probably had more strikeouts today than we did in the whole [Southwest] regional.”

Nagashima fanned eight batters in taking the tough loss.

“Mesa is a tremendous baseball player, he gets tremendous speed on the ball, I think we left him in a little bit longer than we should have,” Steege said.

Matt Oppenheim singled in EMEA’s first two runs with an infield hit in the second and the rally was capped by Cedric Desmedt’s sacrifice fly to left field.

U.S. SOUTHWEST 6, EMEA 4

(9 innings)

Tulsa, Okla. (1-0) Brussels, Belgium (0-2)

Player AB R H BI Player AB R H BI

Robinette, 2b 3 2 1 1 Megashima, p-cf 3 0

Comfort, p-lf 5 1 2 2 King, 3b/ss 4 0

Martin, cf-ss 5 0 1 1 Steege, ss-p 4 0

Reed, ss-p 5 0 3 1 Gerard, cf-rf 3 1 0

Chism, c 4 0 0 0 R. Conway, c 4 2 0

Ambrose, 1b 2 0 2 0 Lyke, 2b 3 0 1

Polly, 1b 1 0 0 0 Oppenheim, lf 3 1 2

Deason, 3b 4 0 0 0 C. Conway, rf 4 0 0

Galbraith, lf 2 0 0 0 Desmedt, 1b 2 1

Maner, lf-cf 2 1 1 0

Mantle, lf-cf 0 1 0 0

Way 3 1 0 0

Totals 36 6 10 5 Totals 31 4 7 4

Brussels 012 000 102 – 6

Oklahoma 030 001 000 – 4

E-Robinette, Comfort, Reed 2; LOB-Southwest 8, EMEA 4; 2B-Ambrose 2; Lyke; SH-Polly; Lyke; SF-Robinette; Desmedt; SB-Robinette 2, Comfort, Maner 2

Oklahoma IP H R ER BB SO

Comfort 6 7 4 3 0 2

Reed (W, 1-0) 3 0 0 0 1 8

Brussels IP H R ER BB SO

Nagashima (L, 0-1) 8 1/3 7 6 4 2 10

Steege 2/3 3 0 0 0 0

HBP-Way, by Nagashima; Gerard, by Comfort; WP-Comfort, Reed; T-2:25; ATT-300 (est.)