SENDAI, Japan (Interstat) — The Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles defeated the Orix Buffaloes 3-2 on Wednesday evening at Kleenex Stadium Miyagi in Sendai. Rakuten improved to 33-49-1, while Orix fell to 42-40-2.

Rakuten struck first in the second inning on Hikaru Ohta’s sacrifice fly. Orix answered with two runs in the third, capitalizing on a sacrifice bunt and a sacrifice fly. The Golden Eagles tied it in the bottom of the third on Ryosuke Tatsumi’s solo home run to left-center. Rakuten took the lead for good in the eighth when Carson McCusker singled home a runner from third.

Tatsumi finished 4 for 4 with a home run and an RBI. Katsutoshi Tai (2-0) earned the win with one scoreless inning of relief. Shoma Fujihira notched his 18th save with a perfect ninth. Ren Mukunoki (2-3) took the loss after allowing one run in one inning.

Starter Kenta Maeda threw seven innings for Rakuten, allowing four hits and two earned runs with three strikeouts. For Orix, reliever Raiku Katayama gave up two runs in 4 1/3 innings. Attendance was 24,110, and the game lasted 3 hours, 18 minutes.