NASSAU, Bahamas – Rarely do both pitchers from both teams combine to throw one-hitters.
Rare are games where a team gets 11 runners on base in seven innings and only manages to scratch out one run.
Both happened in the nightcap at the 2026 Caribbean Baseball Cup Sunday night, where the Bahamas beat Sint Maarten 2-1 despite walking 10 Sint Maarten batters to advance to Monday evening’s championship game, where they will face undefeated Curacao at Andre Rodgers National Baseball Stadium.
Sint Maarten capitalized on wild Bahamian pitching early, with leadoff man Jeldwin Orman drawing a walk in the first. He advanced to second on a sacrifice bunt by Railison Bentura, and successive walks to Victor Draijer, Quintin De Cuba, and Tommy Van De Sanden pushed Orman across the plate for a 1-0 lead.
The Bahamas evened the score in the bottom of the first, with Toby Simmons getting to first with a base on balls. Simmons swiped second and third on consecutive pitches to D’Shawn Knowles, who drew a walk of his own, giving The Bahamas runners at the corners with one out. Byron Murray’s ground out to short got Simmons home to tie the game.
Byron Murray with an RBI groundout and The Bahamas has tied it up at 1 pic.twitter.com/O5DbW0C5W3
— Jeff Duda (@INTLBaseball24) December 8, 2025
Bahamas starter Chad McKenzie struggled with his control, walking four in the top of the first and two more in the second before leaving the game.
In the third, Sint Maarten threatened when Bentura and Draijer drew consecutive walks to start the inning, then advanced on De Cuba’s sacrifice bunt in front of the plate, giving them runners at second and third with one out. They were unable to capitalize when Bahamas reliever Deshaun Forbes got Van De Sanden to pop out to second base and Arthur Bonevacia to fly out to center.
An inning later, Sint Maarten’s Luca Pastor singled, getting his team’s only hit of the game, and advanced to second when Alex Madera followed with a walk, but Orman and Bentura both hit into fielder’s choices at third, ending the inning and Sint Maarten’s last good chance to score.
In the bottom of the fifth, Carl Johnson led off and got hit on the hand by a pitch from Martijn Schoonderwoerd. Dancing off first base, his lead drew Schoonderwoerd’s attention, and then a pick-off throw that was well wide of first base, allowing Johnson to scurry around to third. He came in to score the winner when a pitch to Toby Johnson from Schoonderwoerd went to the backstop.
Chavez Fernander with a strikeout and The Bahamas beats Sint Maarten 2-1! They’ll play Curaçao tomorrow night for the gold medal at the Caribbean Baseball Cup and a spot in the Central American and Caribbean Games next summer in Santo Domingo pic.twitter.com/DNC6Rkaofo
— Jeff Duda (@INTLBaseball24) December 8, 2025
Meanwhile, Chavez Fernander came on to start the fifth on the mound for the Bahamas and was spectacular, using a low 90s fastball with movement to throw three scoreless innings, surrendering only a walk to Raul Jacobs in the fifth and recording three strikeouts.
Curacao (4-0) 8, U.S. Virgin Islands (1-3) 3 – Having already clinched a spot in the championship game, Curacao improved to 4-0 with an 8-3 win over the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Ericson Leonora went 2-for-3 with four RBIs and a run scored, and Stephan Vidal went 2-for-4 as Curacao scored eight runs in the first four innings to cruise into the final game with an undefeated record in preliminary play.
