Norikane Academy vs. Seidou High

Norikane Academy vs. Seidou High
Result
Score	0 - 13
Winner	Seidou High
Match
Manga	Act II, Chapter 189-197
Anime	Episode 52, Season 3 - TBC
Tournament
Tournament	West Tokyo Tournament

The Seidou High vs. Norikane Academy match takes place during the fifth round of the 90th National High School Baseball Championship qualifiers on July 20 at the Daiwa House Stadium Hachioji. It's Seidou's third game of the summer tournament.

Starting Members

• Seidou High

• 1st – Kuramochi Yōichi
• 2nd – Haruichi Kominato
• 3rd – Shirasu Kenjirō
• 4th – Miyuki Kazuya
• 5th – Maezono Kenta
• 6th – Tōjō Hideaki
• 7th – Kanemaru Shinji
• 8th – Asou Takeru
• 9th – Sawamura Eijun

• Norikane Academy

• 1st –
• 2nd –
• 3rd –
• 4th –
• 5th -
• 6th -
• 7th -
• 8th -
• 9th -

Score

Inning	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Total
Norikane Academy	0	0	0	0	0	-	-	-	-	0
Seidou High	6	2	0	5	x	-	-	-	-	13

Summary of the Game

At the start of the first inning Miyuki tells Sawamura to be himself and pitch like usual. He notices that Sawamura is still a little tense but his pitches are looking sharper than they did in the previous round; although they are floating a bit high. The umpire seems to be especially strict on high pitches, so Miyuki is making adjustments on the pitch calling and Sawamura finds his rhythm and he gets 3 ups 3 downs.

The starting catcher for Norikane is a 3rd year, Urabe and this is his first time playing in a tournament. In junior high, he was a pretty good player from Adachi senior but after he enrolled in Teitou, he quit baseball after just 2 weeks. He transferred to Norikane 2 years later and started playing again. Thus Seidou has no data on him and coach Kataoka reminds his players to be cautious. As the pitcher is a tall guy with a normal arm slot and has more velocity than expected, Kataoka says it's important to make adjustments to that. Kuramochi, batting left, jumps on the first pitch and gets on base. Urabe is cautious of Kuramochi but thinks it can't be helped if he were to run and tries to focus on dealing with the next batter, Haruichi. Urabe throws his Splitter and gets a swinging strike. Kataoka and Miyuki determine that the Splitter must be Urabe's winning pitch and the coach instructs Haruichi to hang in there in order to let his teammates in the dugout see wht kind of pitcher they're dealing with. Haruichi works the count for a walk and now they have runners on 1st and 2nd with Shirasu up to bat. Shirasu then hits a 3 run homerun, Miyuki walks, Zono hits a deep center hit which advances the runner, Toujou gets on base with 1 out, Kanemaru is all over the fastball for a 2 RBI, Asou waits for another fastball at 2-0 count and drives in another run. With this Seidou scores 6 runs in the first inning.

Sawamura closes out the top of the 2nd inning cleanly with 3 ups and 3 downs. Urabe was batting 5th and was retired by Sawamura along with the other cleanups. At the bottom of the 2nd Shirasu walks and then tries to steal a run while Miyuki connects for a RBI Double and Shirasu sprints straight home, earning Seidou the 7th run. Norikane finally makes a pitcher switch and they send out No. 12, Miura. He has been pitching very well for Norikane in their previous rounds and seems to be their de facto Ace - according to Nabe's data. Zono hits a RBI Double however, bringing the score to 8-0.

By the top of the 4th, Sawamura gives up the first hit of the game and the runner gets advanced into scoring position. Miyuki thinks that based on the condition of the game, it should be fine to give up 2-3 runs but Sawamura is determined to prevent their opponent from scoring just a single run, although he starts to feel the pressure of Norikane's batters since it's the 2nd go around. They start to connect with his pitches but Sawamura gets out of the jam without ceding a run.

Bottom of the 4th, Shirasu gets a hit and Zono also gets on base due to a fielding error, thus it's 1 out, runners on 1st and 3rd. Toujou is next and drives in a runner and Seidou is up by 9 runs. Kanemaru walks, loading the bases. Yui gets subbed in as a pinch hitter and hits a high Slider and drives in 2 more runs. Sawamura manages to send Kanemaru and Yui home, due to a Squezze play.

After scoring 5 runs in the 4th inning Seidou makes substitutions to almost all of their positions beside the mid-field positions. Sawamura then puts Seidou in the quarter finals by closing out the game on the top of the 5th inning.