Texas first to reach U.S. finals

Richmond defeated Morganton, N.C. 8-2 on Wednesday night.
SOUTH WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. (AP) -- Texas is two steps away from a world championship.
Chance Murski hit a grand slam and Randal Grichuk hit a three-run homer to lead Richmond, Texas, to the United States final with an 8-2 win over Morganton, N.C., on Wednesday night at the Little League World Series.
Texas plays the winner of the Thousand Oaks, Calif., vs. Preston, Md., game on Saturday for the championship. The world championship is Sunday.
"I'm just about as excited as you can get. I'm just emotionally drained," Texas manager Jim Michalek said.
Second inning slam
In the second inning, Tyler Ford doubled, and Matt Daniels and Dustin Moehlig hit consecutive singles to load the bases for Murski. Murski, hitting only .167 in the series, crushed one to left field off Dykota Spiess (0-1) for a 4-0 lead.
"I hung in there and got that pitch," said Murski, who went 1-for-3. "I feel pretty good, but the rest of the at-bats I didn't do that well."
Grichuk, back for his second consecutive Little League World Series, added a three-run homer in the fourth to make it 7-0. It was his fourth homer of the series and sixth in two years. Grichuk is one shy of tying the career home run record held by two players, including Pittsburgh Pirates manager Lloyd McClendon in 1971.
Daniel Homann (2-0) earned his second win of the series, allowing four hits and striking out eight.
Spiess and Eli Watson had RBIs in the sixth inning for North Carolina.
Curacao 9, Taiwan 8
Jonathan Schoop had the game-tying hit in the sixth and the winning hit in the seventh to lead Willem Willemstad, Curacao, Netherlands Antilles into the international championship game with the win over Kaohsiung, Taiwan, Chinese Taipei.
Curacao will play the winner of Corundu, Panama, vs. Nuevo Leon, Mexico, game on Saturday in the championship.
Curacao rallied to tie the game with an improbable four-run sixth, sending it into extra innings before knocking out Taiwan, whose teams won 17 Little League World Series titles between 1969-96.
In the seventh, Rigynoel Rondei singled and advanced to second base on a sacrifice off Taiwan reliever Hsu Chi-Hung. Willie Rifaela hit a grounder to short that Chen Hung-Ta bobbled for an error and Quincey van Blarcum followed with a blooper to Chen Hung that he again misplayed.
That was ruled a hit, however, loading the bases for Schoop.
Schoop singled through the hole into left, extending his arms straight out as he rounded first. He ran toward the mound and met his teammates where they jumped around and danced off the field.
Schoop earned the win with an inning of scoreless relief.
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