HOUSTON, Texas — Italy stunned Team USA 8-6 in World Baseball Classic Pool B Tuesday night at Daikin Park, a result confirmed across multiple independent reports from Reuters, ESPN, MLB.com, NBC News, CBS Sports, and World Baseball Network. The loss leaves the Americans needing help in Wednesday’s Italy-Mexico finale to secure a quarterfinal berth.
- Italy beat the United States 8-6 Tuesday night in World Baseball Classic Pool B at Houston’s Daikin Park.
- Italy surged to an 8-0 lead behind three home runs (Kyle Teel, Sam Antonacci, Jac Caglianone) while starter Michael Lorenzen threw 4 2/3 scoreless innings.
- Team USA finished pool play 3-1 and now needs an Italy win over Mexico on Wednesday or a favorable tiebreaker outcome to reach the quarterfinals.
Additional Details Reported
The U.S. rally fell short despite two home runs from Pete Crow-Armstrong and a late surge that brought the tying run to the plate in the ninth inning, according to NBC News and Reuters.
Italy’s 3-0 start in the pool puts it in position to claim the group with a win over Mexico; a Mexico victory would create a three-way 3-1 tie decided by run-quotient tiebreakers, as outlined by Reuters and ESPN.
Italy manager Francisco Cervelli called the upset one of the best days of his life, while U.S. manager Mark DeRosa acknowledged the team’s fate now rests on Wednesday’s result, per MLB.com and ESPN.
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Photo: Ray Fisher Stadium, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan — Dwight Burdette, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ray_Fisher_baseball_stadium_Ann_Arbor_Michigan.JPG). Cropped to 16:9 and resized to 1920×1080.
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