A DAY after the opening ceremony, action in the Guam Masters Games began with several events taking place throughout the day yesterday.

Over at the Leo Palace baseball field, the ACI Masters and Bank of Guam A’s began the day’s action around the diamond. At the end of seven innings of play, the scoreboard reflected ACI earning a huge 16-7 victory over Bank of Guam.

Both teams came out in playing superb defense in the opening inning, as neither would allow the other to post any early runs and only giving up two hits combined. Later in the second inning, Bank of Guam recorded the game’s first run after an RBI-single by Gene Mendiola pushed teammate Vince Villasoto across home plate. Despite threatening to increase the lead, the A’s were denied as ACI was able to get the final out of the inning.

In the top of the third inning, the Masters capitalized on errors committed by the A’s to equalize the game at 1-1. The two teams continued to keep the game exciting early on. Later in the bottom of the fourth, Bank of Guam regained the one-run lead after Mendiola touched home plate on an ACI error.

The 2-1 lead by the A’s didn’t last too long as the Masters managed to add four runs to their tally over the next two innings to give them a 5-2 lead. The A’s were looking to get themselves back into the game. However, ACI made things a little tougher by adding four more runs to build a 9-2 lead going into the seventh inning.

With only one inning of play left, ACI didn’t settle with a seven-run lead and went to work in the top of the seventh. After Vince Sablan led the inning off with a single, teammate Vic Fernandez hit an RBI-single to bring home another run to make it a 10-2 game. The damage only got worse for the A’s as ACI produced six more runs before the Bank could end the inning. The duo of Mike Aguero and Gerald Castro led the late surge combining for three RBIs and two doubles.

Bank of Guam entered their last chance at-bat facing a 16-2 deficit and needed a huge offensive production to have a chance at stealing a victory. Despite a valiant effort and posting five runs on the board, the A’s would fall short as the ACI Masters' defense buckled down and tallied the game’s final out to end the Bank of Guam comeback attempt.

Guam Masters Games baseball action resumes later today with games beginning at 4 p.m.