第６１回関東地区高等学校野球大会 (61st Fall Kanto Baseball Tournament)

As we take the Shinkansen south, we hit the Kanto region. In what may be a change of power in the area, the championship goes to Keio (Kanagawa) who defeated Narashino (Chiba) 9-6.

(Brackets for the prefectural level and finals are up. I will backtrack to the prefectural regionals once I finish all regional tournaments. )

It wasn't easy though. Keio spotted Narashino 5 runs in the bottom of the 1st! They narrowed the deficit with 2 runs in the 2nd, and 1 in the 3rd. They each traded runs in the 6th, leaving Keio down 6-4 in the 7th. But Narashino couldn't hold off Keio any further. Keio would score 5 runs in the lucky 7th inning to go on to the victory.

This was only Keio's 2nd championship, and first in a whopping 49 years.

The field, which does not include Tokyo as they have their own tournament, surprisingly did not feature Yokohama. In fact, they were defeated in prefectural play by prefectural runner-up Nichidai Fujisawa.

Oddly enough, there were not many well known names in the field this year. Outside of Keio, there was only...

• Nihon Koukuu (Yamanashi) who lost in the first round 5-1 to the only other well known team...
• Maebashi Shougyou (Gunma). They would fall in the semifinals to Keio 8-4.