Like a shot of espresso, Italy jolts Team USA

HOUSTON – They came here singing canzones. Not Dominic Canzone (though he was there) but Italian “canzones.” As in, songs.

The members of Team Italy, instantly bonded by their short exhibition experience in Arizona and headed off to Pool B play here, stood in the aisle of the charter flight, hugging, swaying and belting out Italian ballads.

“I’ve been a part of World Series teams,” Team Italy general manager Ned Colletti said. “But I’ve never seen that.”

Now, the baseball world is singing the praises of the Azzurri, who just stunned the titanic Team USA with an 8-6 victory on Tuesday night at Daikin Park.

Catcher Kyle Teel, shortstop Sam Antonacci and right fielder Jac Caglianone all went deep, starter Michael Lorenzen tamed the star-laden U.S. lineup for 4 2/3 scoreless innings, and the Italian players put themselves in position to potentially win this pool outright.

“An upset like that for an incredible country like Italy … that’s why I love sports and that’s why I love baseball,” Lorenzen said. “And I'm glad that us as a group of guys were able to do that for people.”

Italy will face Mexico on Wednesday night at 7 p.m. ET (watch on Tubi), and the Americans will be watching in their Houston hotel, urging the Azzurri to do to Mexico what they just did to them.

A Team Italy win over Mexico would mean both Italy and the U.S. advance to the quarterfinals.

A Mexico win means Mexico moves on, and the fate of Italy and the U.S. comes down to math.

• Tiebreaker scenarios for USA, Italy, Mexico

In Tuesday’s tilt, the math was pretty simple: Italy went up big early, then held on for dear life late, with the fearsome American captain Aaron Judge representing the tying run at the plate with two out in the bottom of the ninth.

When Judge went down swinging against reliever Greg Weissert, the biggest win in Italian baseball history was complete.

“This is one of the best days of my life,” Team Italy manager Francisco Cervelli said. “I'm proud of my guys. They're young, but they play like they've been in the big leagues for 10 years. Their focus was there. And you know, everybody in Italy should see this. We're doing it for them, for the kids. It can happen. It's possible.”

With most of the roster made up of Italian-Americans, there was extra juice to this game for Team Italy.

Or better yet, extra espresso.

The dugout celebrations centered around team captain Vinnie Pasquantino passing along a shot of espresso to home run hitters donning an Armani sportcoat and then giving them a peck on each cheek have made the rounds. But early in this tournament, a couple hitters had to spit out the espresso – not because Pasquantino had spiked it, but because it was too hot.

“We made an adjustment,” Pasquantino said.

The espresso’s a little cooler, but the bats are still hot.

Facing highly touted Mets rookie Nolan McLean, Team Italy erupted in the second, when two members of the White Sox organization – Teel and Antonacci – both went deep to give Italy an early 3-0 lead.

When Caglianone smoked a 110.4-mph two-run shot off Ryan Yarbrough in the top of the fourth, the U.S.-oriented audience of 38,653 got tense. And when Team USA came unglued in the sixth, with reliever Brad Keller making a throwing error and uncorking a wild pitch in the midst of Italy’s three-run inning, the Italians took an unthinkable 8-0 edge.

Before the game, the members of Team USA had spoken of staying up deep into the night, celebrating an emotional win over Mexico with some drinks and laughs.

Did they take their foot off the gas?

“No,” manager Mark DeRosa said, “I'll credit Italy more than say we were flat.”

DeRosa’s appearance on MLB Network’s “Hot Stove” earlier in the day garnered attention, as the U.S. skipper indicated he was under the impression that his team had already punched its ticket to the quarterfinals, which of course is not the case.

“Yeah, I misspoke,” DeRosa said. “I was on ‘Hot Stove’ with a couple of buddies [Matt Vasgersian and Harold Reynolds] and completely misread the calculations. We knew that Mexico was going to play Italy and then running all the numbers if we lost tonight with the runs allowed and runs scored and outs. I just misspoke.”

Team USA would not have to run any numbers Wednesday if it had successfully come back against Italy.

The Americans almost pulled it off. Propelled late by two home runs from Pete Crow-Armstrong and one from Gunnar Henderson, Team USA managed to make it interesting. With one out in the ninth, Bobby Witt Jr. ripped a single off Weissert. Henderson went down swinging, bringing Judge to the plate with the game on the line and the crowd on its feet.

“I knew the last out would be Judge,” Cervelli said. “I knew that because it's always the best player in on the planet.”

Captain America got his chance, but he went down swinging.

“You always like having your destiny in your own hands,” Judge said. “We had it right in front of us, and Italy came out swinging.”

And they came in singing.