ASSOCIATED PRESS
Washington's Eric Yardley slid past Pearl City's Chance Tanigawa yesterday, as umpire Tony Cooper made the call.
Pearl City Little
Leaguers fall shortThe Hawaii team is shut out in
the district final by Washington
Instead of coming back to win, Pearl City is just coming back home.
The Pearl City Little League team fell one game short in its bid to follow Waipio to the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa., yesterday, losing to Richland, Wash., 5-0 in its district final at San Bernardino, Calif.
"Right now they are taking it pretty hard, but they'll get over it," Pearl City manager Keith Nakamura said. "It was a nice run and something they will take with them for the rest of their lives."
Waipio represented Hawaii in Williamsport last year.
Although it beat Richland 2-1 less than a week ago, undefeated Pearl City came into the final already behind. It could not use its ace pitcher, Alika Pruett, because he pitched too many innings in the semifinal. The team also lost second leading hitter Bully Casarez to a broken bone in his right hand suffered in a dormitory mishap Sunday night.
"He had clearance to play, but we held him out," Nakamura said. "He knew it, and took this harder than anyone."
Richland handed Pearl City its first defeat in the tournament, but Hawaii's Little Leaguers knew all too well the feeling of being behind. Pearl City had trailed in all six of its games in the tournament, rallying to win all but the last one.
But they could not come from behind one last time, digging a five-run hole after three innings and unable to get anything going against Richland's defense. Pearl City hit the ball as hard as it ever had, but committed three errors while seeing Richland make spectacular play after spectacular play on defense. Pearl City was held to four hits by Richland pitcher Kyle Stumetz.
"I think we hit the ball the same as we always had," Nakamura said. "We really didn't break out, but they would have caught it anyway. They will probably make ESPN with some of those plays."
Pearl City is scheduled to arrive here at around 11:30 p.m. tomorrow on a Continental flight.
When the plane touches down at Honolulu Airport, it will mean the end of a long journey for Pearl City.
It had been in California for the past two weeks. Before that, the team spent a summer playing baseball around Oahu and in Cooperstown, N.Y.
The same team that came within a game of Williamsport went 8-1 in a tournament in the shadows of the Baseball Hall of Fame as the Pearl City Young Guns. The players also took in almost as much baseball as it played, being at Yankee Stadium this summer when Roger Clemens earned his 300th win and 4,000th strikeout against the St. Louis Cardinals, and catching the Yankees again in the first game of their interleague series against the Mets.
With all of that experience with the game in such a short amount of time, Nakamura said the boys had little trouble dealing with the bounces a baseball can take.
"That's baseball, what can you say?" said Nakamura, a plant manager for Grace Pacific in his real life. "I told the kids they have nothing to hang their heads about and thanked everyone for giving me a free ride. I hope I still have a job when I get home."
Another Hawaii winner: A team of Hawaii 15-16-year-olds won their first game of their World Series in Bangor, Maine, yesterday, shutting out Russia 5-0.
Sheldon Otsuka threw a no-hitter and Matt Haasenritter went 3-for-4 for Hawaii, which continues pool play against Canada at 4 p.m. HST tomorrow.
