ONE-RUN GAMES THE ORDER OF THE DAY WITH EVENT NOW DOWN TO FINAL THREE

NANJING, CHINA – Another raucous crowd filled the new softball stadium at the Nanjing University of Technology on Sunday night to watch their team’s journey toward the medal games end as Australia broke open a scoreless game with four runs in the bottom of the sixth to down China, 4-0.

The game appeared as if it might turn into an extra innings pitcher’s duel, but the Aussies sent ten batters to the plate in what would be their final at-bat of the night. China didn’t help themselves, committing two errors in the bottom of the sixth and giving up one of the runs on a bases-loaded walk.

Australia had shutout China 1-0 two days earlier.

Just before those two teams took the field, a two-run home run was all Japan needed to down the USA, 2-1. The blast, to right field, came from Yuir Kashima in the top of the fifth. The U.S. got its only score in the bottom half of the same inning.

The two games prior to that one were 1-0 shutouts, with Australia blanking Chinese Taipei, after China had opened the day by beating Canada.

Today’s results set up the following for Monday’s final day of play:

11:00 a.m. - Australia vs. USA (bronze medal game) 1:30 p.m. – Japan vs. winner of 11:00 a.m. game (gold medal game)

(NOTE: both times local to Nanjing)

Japan is the defending champion from the 1999 event (the ISF Jr. Women’s World Championship is played every four years).

For more on this year’s event you can also visit the websites of some of the participating teams. Go to our Members page, and click on the link(s) for the team(s) whose website(s) you’d like to see.