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DEFENDING Big League titlist International Little League Association
of Manila (ILLAM) rose from the dead on Friday with a hairline 2-1
victory over outright finalist Team Manila to rekindle its hopes of
retaining the girls’ softball 14-18 crown in the 2008 Little
League Philippine Series at the Alabang Country Club fields.
Alex Zuluaga matched the combined two-hit job of
Manila’s Felixwinda Custodio and Jennifer Pangilinan in a
no-relief stint on the mound, but did better but forcing the Golden
Girls into a maze of errors at the lower half of the fourth inning
where the 2007 champs scored the decisive two runs.
The two-time World Series veteran herself scored
the winning marker in that period when she boarded on first on an
error by Manila third base girl Harlyn Tubongbanua, stole second and
proceeded home on a passed ball.
Vicky Brias, earlier in the same frame, evened
up matters by crossing the plate, again on an error, this time by
Manila catcher Elma Parojinog.
ILLAM, actually ended up the twos-round,
four-team elimination sharing the top spot with Manila and Bacolod
City East, all with similar 4-2 win-loss cards, but Manila and the
titleholder claimed the two playoff berths on superior quotients.
The ILLAM sluggers were all over the vast
Alabang Country Club equestrian ground as five of their teammates
figured out prominently in the race for the championships in their
respective divisions.
ILLAM bounced back from the brink of elimination
in the 11-12 boys division after beating Talisay City of Negros
Occidental, 3-2, and sharing the Group B lead with Bulacan, a 3-1
winner over Pook Agoncillo of Batangas.
-- Eddie G. Alinea
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