Saint Louis' Dawson Yamaguchi throws a pitch to plate against Mid-Pacific in an ILH Division I contest at Damon Field Tuesday afternoon. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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Saint Louis' Dawson Yamaguchi throws a pitch to plate against Mid-Pacific in an ILH Division I contest at Damon Field Tuesday afternoon. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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MANOA - There's a reason there are eight other guys on the field and Dawson Yamaguchi got all of them involved.

The left-handed pitcher fired a five-hitter without any strikeouts to help No. 2 Saint Louis hold off No. 8 Mid-Pacific Institute, 2-0, Tuesday at Damon Field in Interscholastic League of Honolulu Division I baseball. The Crusaders (10-3) remain a game behind first-place Kamehameha (11-2), which beat Iolani, 7-0, with two games left in the regular season.

Every player for the Crusaders, including the pitcher, recorded at least one putout behind Yamaguchi (3-1), who walked three and hit a batter, but had two runners caught stealing.

"I struggled to throw a second pitch today," Yamaguchi said. "I had to get the ball over the plate with my fastball. I had a great performance from my defense; they helped back me up. Just really proud of them."

The Owls (5-8) left seven runners stranded and at least one in each inning, except the fourth, when the only runner to get on was caught stealing with Yamaguchi was still holding the ball and erased in a rundown.

"We're just not a real good team," MPI coach Dunn Muramaru said. "(Yamaguchi is) a veteran pitcher. Mixes speeds, goes in and out. He reads the hitters. He's just a veteran guy. He's been pitching since the ninth grade, so he's got four years under his belt. He's pitching against guys in their first year starting and it's a huge difference."

Of the 21 outs, 14 were in the air, most of them harmless flies, infield pops or soft liners.

"As a lefty, he has some movement on his pitch," Saint Louis coach George Gusman said. "So it looks like it's there, but it's tailing away, so if you try to pull it, you're going to pop it up."

With Yamaguchi pitching to contact, his defense covered the ground necessary to make the plays.

"We have a lot of trust in our defense," Gusman said. "Our outfielders are very good, obviously up the middle. We had a rookie (Noah Tory) playing second base today because our regular guy (Dylan Pagente) got the flu. Did admirably. I'm very proud of him; got his first hit of the year, too."

Carter Rustad (1-4) was charged with two runs, six hit and a walk with three strikeouts in four-plus innings. JT Navyac settled the game with three perfect innings of relief, but to no avail.

The Crusaders jumped on Rustad in the first. Keith Torres led off with a single and an out later scored on DJ Stephens' double to left-center. After Mattthew Wong singled off third baseman Jacob Yoshino, Rustad struck out the next two batters.

Saint Louis added its second run in the third. Torres again led off with a single, but was forced out at second when Charles Lopez reached on a fielder's choice grounder to second. Lopez stole second on a 2-0 pitch and after Stephens ran a the count 3-0 he was intentionally walked. Wong then smashed a single off third baseman Yoshino to score Lopez, but Stephens was gunned down going from first to third for the second out. Aaron Renaud flied out to center to end the inning.

Mid-Pacific had two runners reach base only in the bottom of the seventh. With one out, Corey Takahashi singled and pinch runner Shea Yamaguchi took second when Breyndon Nakamura walked. Dawson Yamaguchi then got Ryne Aniya to pop out to second and Wyatt Young to pop out to short to end the game.

It was Yamaguchi's second complete-game win of the season.

"These guys have special powers at this place," Gusman said of the Owls playing at home. "We can't make anything easy, so for (Yamaguchi) to finish is great. They had the top of the order coming up. We had a couple of guys warming up, but it was good for him to finish. Absolutely."