The team from Tokyo, Japan has won the Little League World Series Championship Game from Williamsport, Pa., downing the nearby Lewisberry, Pa. team, 18-11, on Sunday afternoon.
If you liked home runs, this was the game to watch. No, really -- they hit a whole lot of home runs.
Japan jumped to an early lead in the first inning, when Shingo Tomita and Yugo Aoki scored runs, but Pennsylvania came roaring back in the bottom of the inning. First, they scored a few runs to go up 3-2, but it didn't end there. Dylan Rodenhaber came up with the bases loaded and hit a home run to right field, scoring Camden Walter, Ethan Phillips and Jake Cubbler to make it a 7-3 game. Daiki Fukuyama was the pitcher that loaded the bases, and he was replaced by Masafuji Nishijima, who allowed the grand slam.
The scoring didn't slow down there, though, as Pennsylvania managed to put up three more points before things moved to the second inning, whereJapan fought back with a vengeance. Japan put up a total of seven runs themselves in the second inning to pull within one run.
Things did slow down from there, with a couple scoreless innings in the fourth and the fifth, but Japan got hot again in the sixth and took a stranglehold of a lead with five more runs, and Pennsylvania was unable to answer, getting shutout beyond the third inning. Shingo Tomita had four runs and three hits in the game for Japan.
The matchup for third-place was between Texas, who fell to Pennsylvania in the U.S championship game, and Mexico, who lost to Japan in the international bracket. Isaac Garcia hit a three-run home run in the top of the sixth to lift Texas to a 6-4 win and the third-place crown for the tournament.