Game 1: SPR 5, BLF 0- Jeff Francis delivers complete game 7-hit shutout, Matt Diaz and Eric Hinske each bang out three hits for Springfield.
Game 2: BLF 6, SPR 5- Back-and-forth affair sporting four lead changes and five homers. Omar Vizquel broke a 7th inning 5-5 tie with an RBI single off Brian Fuentes. (He promptly celebrated by getting picked off.) Trever Miller wins it with two innings of scoreless relief, Betancourt a one-batter save.
Game 3: BLF 9, SPR 3- Belfast busts it open late when Sizemore's base-clearing double caps 6-run 7th inning, Carlos Zambrano a complete game victory with 10 K.
Game 4: SPR 7, BLF 3- Ben Broussard tied the game in the bottom of the sixth with a 2-run single, and the next batter, Mike Piazza, untied it with a 2-run homer. Jeff Francis with his second win of the series, Trevor Hoffman with a 4-out save.
Game 5: BLF 4, SPR 3- This game was tied 1-1 through 10 innings, but not for lack of action, as each team stranded 11 in the game. Cirillo's hit and run single broke the tie in the top of the 11th, but Vizquel later singled home 2 insurance runs, which was huge when SPR rallied off Francisco Liriano in the bottom of the inning. Liriano ended up with 12 K in 10.1 innings, and Trever Miller standed the tying run on third for the save.
Series returns to Belfast with the Buzzards up a game.
Jorge Posada hits a three run homer off of Carlos Villanueva in the bottom of the 5th that puts BLF ahead 7-1. SPR rallies for 3 in the 8th an 1 in the 9th to make things interesting but falls just short of extending the series. So Belfast moves on.
Omar Vizquel hit .500 for the series and played flawless defense. Carlos Zambrano pitched well with two wins and a 2.25 ERA.
Matt Diaz hit .538 and Jeff Francis shut BLF down in two starts, one a complete game shut out, going 2-0 with a 1.72 ERA.
Kudos to Kevin who managed brilliantly. If Villanueva hadn't let him down, he would have probaly won the series as BLF couldn't hit Francis (SPR's starter for game 7.
