NAGOYA, Japan (Interstat) — For eight innings Friday night, the Hanshin Tigers and Chunichi Dragons engaged in a tense, low-scoring duel defined by stellar starting pitching and missed opportunities. Then, the ninth inning arrived, and the Tigers’ offense erupted.

Hanshin sent nine men to the plate in the final frame, scoring four runs to break a late tie and secure a 5-3 victory over Chunichi at Nagoya Dome. The win improved the Central League-leading Tigers to 9-4, while the struggling Dragons fell to 3-9.

The game’s most critical sequence unfolded in the top of the ninth with the score tied 1-1. Facing Dragons reliever Shinya Matsuyama, Teruaki Sato led off with a double down the right-field line. Yusuke Ohyama, who finished 3 for 4, followed by lacing a single to center, scoring Sato to give Hanshin a 2-1 lead. After a stolen base and a groundout, the Tigers had a runner on third with two outs.

Matsuyama then walked Nozomu Takatera, bringing pinch-hitter Ukyo Maegawa to the plate. Maegawa delivered, smoking a double down the right-field line to score another run. Koji Chikamoto, the Tigers’ dynamic center fielder, then capped the rally by drilling another double down the right-field line, scoring Maegawa. Chikamoto, who had a brilliant night going 4 for 5 with an RBI and two stolen bases, came home on Takumu Nakano’s single to complete the four-run outburst.

That offensive explosion made a winner of Atsuki Yuasa, who pitched the eighth inning for Hanshin. Yuasa allowed one run on one hit, striking out two, to move to 1-0. Matsuyama took the loss, falling to 0-1 after being charged with four runs in two-thirds of an inning.

The late drama overshadowed a magnificent pitchers’ duel for the first two-thirds of the game. Hanshin’s Shoki Murakami, named the top star, continued his excellent early-season form, tossing seven strong innings. He allowed one run on six hits, walking none and striking out four. He has now pitched seven innings and allowed just one earned run in each of his last two starts.

He was matched nearly pitch-for-pitch by Chunichi’s Yuya Yanagi, who was even more dominant over six innings. Yanagi limited the powerful Tigers lineup to one run on five hits, striking out six without issuing a walk. His lone mistake was a solo home run to Shota Morishita leading off the sixth inning, which at the time tied the game 1-1.

Chunichi had built an early lead with single runs in the second and third innings off Murakami. In the second, Shuhei Takahashi singled and later scored on Takuya Kinoshita’s groundout. In the third, Seiya Hosokawa doubled home Hiroki Fukunaga, who had singled and been sacrificed to second.

The Dragons threatened to tie or take the lead in the eighth against Yuasa. Hosokawa walked, stole second, and scored on Asahi Hanada’s sacrifice fly to cut the deficit to 5-3, but the rally stalled there.

Hanshin closer Suguru Iwazaki then worked a scoreless ninth, navigating around two hits to record his fourth save of the season. He got Jason Vosler to ground out to shortstop with two runners on to end the game, which took 3 hours, 40 minutes to complete before a crowd of 36,663.

The victory extended Hanshin’s strong start to the season and continued a troubling pattern for Chunichi, which has now lost nine of its first twelve games. The Tigers finished with 12 hits, while the Dragons collected nine.

The result aligned with the pregame projection from Interstat, whose game simulator had predicted a 5-3 Hanshin victory. The Tigers were also installed as betting favorites with a spread of +1.5, and the total score of 8 went over the listed over/under line of 5.5.

The two teams will continue their three-game series at Nagoya Dome on Saturday.