R.I., Fla. teams to meet in Little League semifinals

R.I., Fla. teams to meet in Little League semifinals

By The Associated Press
Arizona Daily Wildcat
August 22, 1996

The Associated Press
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Taipei runner Chao-Kuan Wu safely slides in before the tag by British Columbia catcher Joseph Stryjak during the first inning yesterday at the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa.

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. - Winning isn't everything, and the Little League East champions from Cranston, R.I., proved it.
Cranston (1-2) yesterday became the first team with a losing record to advance to the Little League World Series semifinals since the league adopted its pool format in 1992.
Cranston, a 6-1 loser to Marshalltown, Iowa, will play Panama City, Fla., (3-0) tonight in the U.S. semifinal. Taiwan (3-0), which has won the series 11 of the last 22 years, will play the Dominican Republic (2-1).
The winners advance to the championship game Saturday.
Cranston backed into the semifinal because of Panama City's 10-2 win over Moorpark, Calif., late Wednesday. Moorpark was also 1-2, so it needed to hold Panama City to six runs or less to win a tiebreaker based on runs allowed per inning.
Iowa (1-2) is out of contention because it gave up only a fraction more runs per inning than Rhode Island, which has a team in the series for only the third team in 50 years.
Rhode Island fans at Lamade Stadium went bonkers when Jeff Boutwell ignored a bunt sign from coach Dennis Shields and hit a two-run home run to give Panama City an 8-1 lead in the fourth.
''When we were down 4-1, I knew we had to hold them to six, and I went around and told the kids that, and then their kids just kept hitting the ball out of the park,'' Moorpark manager Hector Garcia said.
Chris Sison and Josh Cooper also homered, and Sison went 4-for-4 for Panama City, the first Florida team in the series in five years. Sison has his sights on the heavily favored Taiwan team, deemed the Far East for the series.
''We want to play the Far East. Our goal has been to play the Far East, and all along we have been working toward playing the Far East,'' Sison said.
Taiwan beat Canada 21-2, and the Dominican Republic beat the mostly American team from Saudi Arabia 13-0 Wednesday. Both games were called off early because of the large leads. Little League rules provide for an early end if one team is ahead by 10 runs after 31/2 innings.
Taiwan has won big before, beating Spring, Texas, 17-3 in 31/2 innings in last year's championship game and Irvine, Calif., 21-1 in the 1987 final.
Chen Chao-pin hit two home runs as Taiwan scored 13 runs and sent 17 batters to the plate in the fourth against outmanned Canada. Chiu Chi-pin also hit two home runs, and 4-foot-11, 95-pound Hsieh Chin-hsi hit his fourth homer of the series. He has a chance to break the five-game series record of six home runs, set last year by Lin Chih-hsiang of Taiwan.