KYODO NEWS - Apr 13, 2017 - 22:11 | Sports, All

The Hiroshima Carp, last year's kings of comeback, showed they haven't lost their style, scoring seven ninth-inning runs in an 11-5 win over the Yomiuri Giants on Thursday.

The win, before 49,922 completed the Carp's three-game sweep at Tokyo Dome. Hiroshima has 10 wins and one tie since losing 10-6 on Opening Day.

Trailing by a run in the ninth, the Carp tied it on Ryuhei Matsuyama's pinch-hit homer against new Giants closer Arquimedes Caminero (0-1), who had saved his previous four games.

Matsuyama went deep on Caminero's first pitch and the game quickly unraveled for the hosts. After a walk, an error by Caminero on the ensuing sacrifice attempt put runners on second and third. Yoshihiro Maru then singled in both runners.

"Everyone set that inning up for me," said Maru, who bats third ahead of red-hot cleanup hitter Takahiro Arai. "We had some momentum from (Matsuyama). I really wanted to bring home the runners, but my thoughts, with Arai and the big guys coming up behind me, were more toward just keeping the rally alive."

Tomohiro Abe singled in Maru, knocking Caminero from the game, and scored along with Seiya Suzuki on Yoshiyuki Ishihara's home run on the first pitch from rookie Shun Ikeda.

Giants first baseman Shinnosuke Abe and third baseman Casey McGehee were poised to be the Giants heroes until Caminero suffered his first poor outing in Japan. Abe doubled in a run in the first and singled in a tiebreaking run in the fifth, while McGehee hit his first homer in Japan since he starred for the Rakuten Eagles in 2013.

His two-run shot cut the Carp's first-inning lead to 4-3, and he tied it with an RBI double in the third.

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Swallows 3, Dragons 2

At Jingu Stadium, new import David Buchanon allowed two runs in eight innings, and Atsushi Ugumori's two-out sayonara single in the ninth lifted Yakult past Chunichi and snapped the Swallows' six-game losing streak.

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Tigers 4, BayStars 1

At Yokohama Stadium, Hanshin scored three ninth-inning runs off DeNA closer Yasuaki Yamasaki (0-1), with Shun Takayama's one-out RBI single breaking a 1-1 tie. A second run scored on a passed ball, and Hiroki Uemoto followed with an RBI single. Tigers starter Shintaro Fujinami (1-1) allowed a run in eight innings for the win.

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Pacific League

Fighters 3, Hawks 2

At Sapporo Dome, former Cleveland Indians and Yomiuri Giants farmhand Toru Murata made his first career start in Japan's top flight and allowed a run in four innings and didn't figure in the decision for Nippon Ham, who scored three runs off SoftBank starter Rick van den Hurk (0-2) in 4-2/3 innings.

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Marines 3, Buffaloes 2

At Kyocera Dome, Yuji Nishino (1-1) allowed a run in six innings, and Kei Hosoya overturned a one-run deficit with a three-run, seventh-inning homer to lift Lotte past Orix.