Timely hits pay dividends for Hawaii Rasa, Nakamura lift U.S. West past New Jersey into today’s championship

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BANGOR – The experience of playing in last year’s Senior League World Series taught pitcher Jason Rasa and the rest of the U.S. West team from Pearl City, Hawaii, a couple of valuable lessons.

First, stay loose. Second, don’t let up. Third, score early.

This year’s Pearl City team was able to lean on the first two lessons when the third faltered during Friday afternoon’s semifinal.

Hawaii needed a third-inning rally, but last year’s tournament runnerup is back in the championship game after earning a 7-3 victory over the U.S. East team from Bloomfield, N.J., at Mansfield Stadium.

Pearl City will again try to score early in today’s 2:30 p.m. final. Hawaii, now 5-0, will face Latin America champ Falcon, Venezuela, which defeated U.S. South champ Yorktown, Va., 11-1 in the other semifinal.

“We know it’s easier if we score runs first because last year we had to come back every game,” Rasa said. “This year we’ve tried to jump on them first.”

New Jersey, which ends its World Series run with a 3-2 record, outhit Hawaii 10-9 but stranded nine runners while Hawaii left five.

“I felt if we had a couple more innings the defense would have held it together, we could have had a couple more hits, and we would have been fine,” New Jersey coach Dave Del Vecchio said.

Rasa (2-0) struggled early, giving up three straight singles and a walk in the first inning. He also had a wild pitch in the inning that allowed New Jersey to score its second run of the inning after Richard Monroig singled in the first run.

Rasa allowed at least one baserunner in each inning.

“I was getting frustrated,” he said. “My coach talked to me, calmed me down, and eventually I got it together.”

Rasa did just that in the fifth as New Jersey’s Kevin Miller and Mike Chiaravalloti hit back-to-back doubles. Miller scored but Chiaravalloti was eventually stranded at second with no outs as Rasa got two strikeouts and a flyout.

Hawaii had its share of popups early against New Jersey starter Vinnie Del Vecchio. New Jersey center fielder Dan Bataille made all three outs in the first, and after Bryson Nakamura hit a leadoff single in the second, Hawaii had three more popups.

“We just needed to relax and play,” Nakamura said. “We just had to play the game.”

It could have been Del Vecchio’s curveball.

“He was throwing his curveball more and that’s when [Hawaii] was popping up,” Hawaii manager Gary Nakamoto said. “When they got patient with the curveball they started hitting.”

Things got out of hand for Vinnie Del Vecchio in the third. After inducing a leadoff groundout, he hit Kurt Poentis on the back, followed by singles from Rorry Nakayama, Ryne Acosta and Carlton Tanabe.

Del Vecchio also committed an error when he overthrew a pitchout to first base.

Nakamura hit a line-drive triple to right, plating Tanabe. Nakamura later scored on another error.

Nakamura learned a lesson of his own in the game. He was ready for a Del Vecchio curve, and he drove it into right.

“I figured he was going to do that because he threw me a fastball earlier,” he said.

In the fourth Bryson Namba doubled and scored, Tanabe singled in Poentis (single) and Acosta scored on New Jersey’s third error of the game.

U.S. WEST 7, U.S. EAST 3

Bloomfield, N.J. (3-2) Pearl City, Hawaii (5-0)

Player AB R H BI Player AB R H BI

V.DelVcchio, p-ss 3 0 0 0 R. Nakayama, cf 4 0

Miller, ss-p 4 2 2 0 Acosta, ss 2 1 1

Chiaravalloti, 1b 4 0 3 1 Tanabe, c 4 1

Penberthy, 1b-cf 0 1 0 0 B. Nakamura, 1b 3 1

Monroig, rf 4 0 1 1 Rasa, p 3 0 1 0

Petrillo, 3b 0 0 0 0 Sugitaya, ph 0 0 0

Chesterman, 3b 2 0 1 0 Abreu, 3b 0 0

Bataille, cf 4 0 1 0 Tampos, 3b 3 0 0

Mazzolla, c 1 0 0 0 Casarez, 2b 0 0 0

Andrade, c 2 0 0 0 Kiyota, 2b 2 0 0

J. Del Vecchio, 2b 3 0 1 0 Dekneef, rf 0 0

Szuhany, lf 2 0 1 0 Namba, rf 3 0 0

Poentis, lf 1 2 1 1

Domingo, lf 1 0 0 0

Totals 29 3 10 2 Totals 26 7 9 4

New Jersey 200 010 0 – 3

Hawaii 004 300 x – 0

E-V. Del Vecchio, Miller 2; LOB-New Jersey 9, Hawaii 9; 2B-Miller, Chiaravalloti; 3B-Nakamura; DP-New Jersey 1, Hawaii 1; SB-Monroig; Nakamura, Poentis

New Jersey IP H R ER BB SO

V. Del Vecchio (L, 0-1) 3 2/3 8 7 5 0 1

Miller 2 1/3 1 0 0 2 1

Hawii IP H R ER BB SO

Rasa (W, 2-0) 7 10 3 3 3 5

HBP-Peontis (by V. Del Vecchio), Acosta (by V. Del Vecchio); Raha (by Szuhany); PB-Andrade; T-1:57; ATT-752