Small ball goes long way in No. 4 Baldwin's win over No. 7 Hilo

Greg Yamamoto | SL

MANOA - No. 4 Baldwin endured two delays en route to its 5-4 win against No. 7 Hilo in the quarterfinals of the Wally Yonamine Foundation Division I state baseball tournament Thursday at Les Murakami Stadium.

The Bears (14-3) advance to Thursday's semifinal at 7 p.m.

The Bears took a 5-1 lead entering the bottom of the seventh inning when the game was delayed 11 minutes because of rain. When play resumed, the relentless Vikings (14-2) prolonged the Bears' victory by sending nine batters to the plate, scoring three runs, but leaving the bases loaded when Isaac Imamura came in from second base to strike out Jayden Geraci the preserve the win for the save.

"It's hard," Imamura said of entering the pressure situation from a position since he can't take warmups until he is summoned to the mound. "Everything is all squeezed, tight, so I was just trying to throw strikes."

He did. After two called strikes on Geraci, Imamura dropped a curve on the outside corner to the right-handed hitter for strike three.

It was his second save in as many games. He pitched a scoreless seventh in Tuesday's first-round win against Moanalua. Imamura relishes the pressure.

"I felt good," Imamura said. "I wanted to pitch. I pitched yesterday, last inning, same thing, I struck out the last guy."

Geraci and Baldwin starting pitcher Kade Fujioka engaged in a duel through five scoreless innings. The Bears sent nine batters up in a five-run sixth using small ball. Of their three sacrifice's in the inning, batters reached on errors twice.

"We do this all year," Imamura said. "Bunting off the machine and practicing our defense every day."

The Bears broke the scoreless duel in the sixth. Laakea Ko led off with a single, and took second on Isaiah Chaves' single to short. Christian Dommino bunted to third to move the runners, but a throwing error scored Ko and Chaves, as Dommino made it to third. He scored on Caleb Miyake-Matsubayashi's single to make it 3-0. Kaden Anderson then dropped a bunt and reached safely on an error. The two runners advanced on Fujioka's sacrifice. After Imamura struck out, Douglas Mortensen was hit by a pitch to load the bases. An error scored the tying run before a runner was gunned down trying to steal third.

The Vikings finally got to Fujioka in the bottom of the sixth on back-to-back doubles by Kamren Agpalza and Baba Lancaster.

Hilo started a rally in the home seventh. Talus Sato led off with a walk and after one one, took second on Jarren Sakamoto's single. Koa Marzo Jr.'s single loaded the bases. Agpalza was hit by a pitch to force home a run. After Lancaster fouled out to first for the second out. Fujioka was pulled for Rabor, who walked Zion Palea to bring another run in to make it 5-3. Imamura was brought in with a 1-0 count on Dylan Villanueva and walked him to force home another run to make it 5-4. But Imamura struck out Geraci to end the threat and save the game.

Reach Stacy Kaneshiro at [email protected].