NALB 2006 World Championship Series - Game 1

K. Fields
2007-10-22T19:22:55-04:00
Baseball

The North American League Baseball 2006 World Championship Series opened in Brooklyn as it has for the past six seasons. The Brooklyn Knights hosted the Stade Maples for Game 1. Back in 2004, these two teams faced each other for the championship and the Knights swept the Maples in four games.

The Maples had confidence with lefty starter Wally Pemberton (18-6) on the mound. Brooklyn's Dave Hambright (12-9) got the Game 1 start despite a sub-par year by his standards. The Knights wasted no time getting on the board in the first inning. After a Dan Kelley walk and a Jeff Castino double, Hooks Goetz singled in the first run of the game. The pitching duel continued into the fourth inning when the Maples tied the score at 1-1. Travis Araoz tripled to deep center field and later scored Stade's first run. Hambright and Pemberton had their stuff working as the score was unchanged heading into the sixth inning. Paul Lyons, Stade's powerful first baseman, was the team's designated hitter for Game 1. He hit a 2-run homer into the right field stands to put his team ahead 3-1 in the top of the sixth. In the eighth inning, Stade exploded with an 8-run inning, powered by another Lyons home run and a grand slam by Gene Anson. Brooklyn would not recover. They scored two runs in the bottom of the eighth but the deficit was too large to overcome.

Final score: Stade 11, Brooklyn 3