Sunday, May 3, 2009

SENDAI (AP) Hisashi Iwakuma did not have his best stuff but got enough run support for his third win as the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles beat the Orix Buffaloes 7-3 Saturday for their fourth straight victory.

Flying high: Eagles ace Hisashi Iwakuma throws a pitch during Rakutens 7-3 victory over the Orix Buffaloes on Saturday in Sendai. KYODO PHOTO

Surprise Pacific League leader Rakuten built a 7-0 lead early on chasing Satoshi Komatsu (0-3) in the process at Kleenex Stadium.

Veteran slugger Takeshi Yamasaki opened the scoring with a two-run double and Teppei Tsuchiya tripled in two runs in a five-run first inning.

"I believe that the way we've won games is a sign of our growth as a team," Yamasaki said. "Not only Iwakuma and (Masahiro) Tanaka but (Satoshi) Nagai is pitching well in the starting rotation. Hopefully, we'll keep this momentum going."

Iwakuma (3-1) carried a shutout into the sixth before giving up a two-out RBI double to Hirotoshi Kitagawa. The right-hander ended up allowing three runs and 12 hits in seven innings of work.

Tuffy Rhodes hit his league-leading 11th home run with a two-run shot in the seventh.

Fighters 7, Lions 6 (11)

At Sapporo Dome, Terrmel Sledge hit a walk-off sacrifice fly in the 11th inning as Hokkaido Nippon Ham beat Seibu to snap a three-game losing streak.

Hichori Morimoto led off the bottom of the 11th with a single, his fifth hit of the afternoon, and went on to score on Sledge's one-out fly ball to right at Sapporo Dome.

Seibu had four home runs in the game, including Hiroyuki Nakajima's first of the season.

Marines 9, Hawks 4

At Yahoo Dome, Tsuyoshi Nishioka and Tadahito Iguchi hit back-to-back home runs in the fifth inning, leading Chiba Lotte past Fukuoka Softbank.

Yuki Karakawa (2-2) allowed three runs and eight hits in six innings for Lotte.

Giants 6, Tigers 5

At Koshien Stadium, Hayato Sakamoto homered twice and drove in four runs as Central League leader Yomiuri edged Hanshin.

Sakamoto hit a three-run home run off Atsushi Nomi in the fourth inning and broke a 5-5 tie with a shot to left off Kyuji Fujikawa (1-1) leading off the top of the ninth.

BayStars 6, Dragons 1

At Yokohama Stadium, Daisuke Miura pitched eight innings of one-run ball as Yokohama handed Chunichi its fourth consecutive defeat.

Carp 9, Swallows 2

At Mazda Stadium, Soichiro Amaya hit a tiebreaking triple, Kenta Kurihara followed with an RBI single and Scott McClain added a two-run homer as Hiroshima used a four-run sixth inning to beat Tokyo Yakult.

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