• Astros clip St. Louis, 4-1 • Mokihana’s Bill Smith trials set for Saturday • Figure skating goes to the opera Astros clip St. Louis, 4-1 By Paul Newberry – ASSOCIATED PRESS ST. LOUIS — Yes, it is possible to
• Astros clip St. Louis, 4-1
• Mokihana’s Bill Smith trials set for Saturday
• Figure skating goes to the opera
Astros clip St. Louis, 4-1
By Paul Newberry – ASSOCIATED PRESS
ST. LOUIS — Yes, it is possible to win on the road in the NL championship series. Roy Oswalt showed the way for Houston, silencing the St. Louis Cardinals and all their red-clad fans.
Oswalt pitched seven stellar innings, closer Brad Lidge finished up and the Astros defeated the Cardinals 4-1 Thursday night, evening the best-of-seven series at one game apiece.
Houston scrounged for a couple of runs off Mark Mulder — one scoring on a passed ball, the other on Craig Biggio’s groundout. The Astros added two more in the eighth off reliever Julian Tavares.
Division series hero Chris Burke came through again, scoring one run and driving in another with a two-out single in the eighth — ending Houston’s 0-for-14 drought with runners in scoring position.
Lidge came on for a two-inning save, closing out the six-hitter with three strikeouts.
Oswalt allowed only five hits, struck out six and didn’t let a runner past second base except for Albert Pujols, who led off the sixth with a 438-foot home run that cleared the Houston bullpen.
Otherwise, Oswalt made every big pitch he needed, improving his career postseason record to 3-0.
The Cardinals went 0-for-6 against the right-hander with runners in scoring position. Oswalt twice faced Jim Edmonds with two runners on — and came out on top both times against the dangerous left-handed hitter.
In the fifth, Edmonds took a called third strike on a 3-2 pitch. Two innings later, the crowd of 52,358 — nearly all of them adorned in red — was in an uproar after the Cardinals put runners at first and second with only one out.
Mokihana’s Bill Smith trials set for Saturday
Mokihana Aquatics is having its Bill Smith swim trials on Saturday and Sunday at the Kaua’i High School pool. The public is invited to attend free of charge. Come and see some of the best youth swimmers on the island. There will also be the only Speedo concession stand on the island to check out, while watching the swimmers gut it out for the upcoming Bill Smith Invitational. The trials will run from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday and 8:30 a.m. to 11 a.m. on Sunday.
Figure skating goes to the opera
BOSTON — The Nancy Kerrigan-Tonya Harding soap opera is now a musical opera. The figure skating saga that captivated the country 11 years ago — with the ubiquitous video of Kerrigan crying “Why me?” after being attacked and hit in the knee — is the basis for “Nancy and Tonya: The Opera,” to be performed at Tufts University next spring.
Kerrigan became a household name when an associate of Harding’s clubbed her on the knee with a baton as she left the ice during practice at the 1994 U.S. championships in Detroit.
