Aberdeen, Md. — The O'ahu All-Stars captured the Cal Ripken World Series (12 years old and younger) title last night with a nearly flawless 1-0 win over Team Mexico, the two-time defending series champion. The game was played on Cal Sr.'s Yard.

O'ahu used the stellar pitching of starter and winner Kalani Lagoc-Crawford to silence the Mexico bats, as well as the usually loud Mexico crowd.

"I wasn't expecting to pitch that good," said Lagoc-Crawford, who baffled opposing hitters with a fastball and curve ball. Lagoc-Crawford threw four strong innings, allowing one hit and two walks, while striking out 11.

Lagoc-Crawford's biggest trouble came in his final inning of work. He walked two straight batters with two outs in the fourth and then regrouped to strike out Francisco Maturin looking on three pitches.

"Phenomenal, I'm so happy for him because he was with us last year when we came up two games short," said O'ahu manager Gerald Oda on the all-around play of Lagoc-Crawford. "What he did today, especially in that fourth inning ... He was tired and I went out and asked to just get us one more batter and everything else will fall into place with the bullpen and so-forth."

That bullpen consisted of Kewby Meyer, the tournament's Most Outstanding Player in the U.S. Division, coming on in the sixth and striking out the side on 12 pitches to earn his third save of the tourney.

Jordan DePonte threw a scoreless fifth inning, striking out one, setting up Meyer in the sixth.

Lagoc-Crawford, as he did in O'ahu's Saturday U.S. Championship win, also knocked in the game's lone run yesterday with a extra-base hit.

The big hit came in the bottom of the second inning after center fielder Ryan Yamane led off with a double to short left field on a fly ball that Mexico left fielder Gustavo Dominguez got a glove on, but could not hold.

Lagoc-Crawford then hit a full count pitch that bounced over the wall in right-center field, plating Yamane.

One pitch later, a fly ball off the bat of DePonte was caught by Dominguez and turned into a double play as Lagoc-Crawford was caught off second base.

Kash Kalohelani followed with a single that chased Mexico starting and eventual losing pitcher Axel Rios from the mound.

Those three hits in the second were all O'ahu got as Dominguez entered the game and struck out seven over the next 3 1/3 innings.

"Oh, this is great, I never thought it would happen to me," said shortstop Timmy Arakawa, who had never played in a World Series before. "Just stunned, we had a great team this year, never knew this would happen."

Lagoc-Crawford echoed Arakawa's feelings, saying, "It feels great, being the first team from Hawai'i to win it."

After winning the U.S. Championship Saturday, manager Oda vowed that his team would have fun, win or lose, to Mexico.

"It was a phenomenal game, because the last inning before we took the field I almost lost it in front of my boys, I was so emotional, I was so proud of our kids," Oda said. "I told them, we're not losing right here guys, what we've done these last two weeks, what we've done this whole tournament run, it's just phenomenal, we can't be more proud of our kids."

The team is scheduled to return to Honolulu today on United flight 43 at 2:49 p.m.

O'AHU ALL-STARS

Kash Kalohelani, Dylan Goto, Jake Fujimoto, Joe Yokoi, Kewby Meyer, Ryan Cortez, Timmy Arakawa, Chris Sekiguchi, Cory Quiamzon, Gavin Okada, Wilkins Kato, Jordan DePonte, Kalani Lagoc-Crawford, Ryan Yamane. Manager: Gerald Oda. Coaches: Keith Oda, Staphe Fujimoto.

MEXICO O'AHU

AB R H BI AB R H BI

OROSCO RF 3 0 0 0 ARAKAWA SS 2 0 0 0

ALVAREZ 2B 3 0 0 0 OKADA 2B 2 0 0 0

DOMINGUEZ LF 3 0 0 0 MEYER 1B 1 0 0 0

GUTIERREZ 3B 3 0 0 0 CORTEZ 3B 1 0 0 0

MARTINEZ CF 1 0 0 0 YOKOI PH 1 0 0 0

ISLAVA C 1 0 0 0 YAMANE CF 1 1 1 0

MENDOZA C 0 0 0 0 GOTA PH 1 0 0 0

MATURIN 1B 2 0 1 0 L.-CRAWFORD P 1 0 1 1

RIOS P 1 0 0 0 FUJIMOTO PH 1 0 0 0

LEAL PH 1 0 0 0 DEPONTE RF 1 0 0 0

PAEZ SS 2 0 0 0 KATO PH 1 0 0 0

KALOHELANI C 2 0 1 0

QUIAMZON LF 1 0 0 0

SEKIGUCHI PH 1 0 0 0

TOTALS 20 0 1 0 TOTALS 17 1 3 1

MEXICO 000 000—0 1 0

O'AHU ALL-STARS 010 000—1 3 1

E—Cortez.

2B—Maturin, Yamane, Lagoc-Crawford.

Mexico IP H R ER BB SO Rios, L 1 1/3 3 1 1 1 0

DOMINGUEZ 3 2/3 0 0 0 2 7

O'AHU ALL-STARS

LAGOC-CRAWFORD, W 4 1 0 0 2 11

DEPONTE 1 0 0 0 0 1

MEYER, S 1 0 0 0 0 3

PB—Mendoza.