WBC Tonight: March 17

Tonight is the third quarterfinal of the World Baseball Classic and the first in the United States. Tonight’s contest takes place at loanDepot park in Miami between Mexico and Puerto Rico. The game starts at 6pm Central time and will be broadcast on FS1.

The Cubs’ Marcus Stroman will start for Puerto Rico. The Dodgers Julio Urías starts for Mexico.

Mexico advanced to this game by winning Pool C in Phoenix with a 3-1 record. Mexico lost their first game, 5-4 in ten innings to Colombia, who ended up finishing last in the group. But Mexico bounced back in their next game by throttling Team USA, 11-5 and then finished up with a 2-1 win over Great Britain and a 10-3 win over Canada. By virtue of beating the USA, Mexico won the group on the head-to-head tiebreaker.

In Urías’ first start of the tournament against Colombia, he allowed three runs on three hits over five innings. All three runs scored in the fifth inning. Urías did strike out six and walked no one.

Puerto Rico also finished group play 3-1, but that was only good enough for second place after Venezuela finished with a 4-0 record in Group D. Puerto Rico won their first game against Nicaragua, 9-1, before dropping their second game 9-6 to Puerto Rico. But a 10-0 win over Israel in eight innings and a 5-3 win over the Dominican Republic was enough to move Puerto Rico on to the next round.

In his first start of the tournament against Nicaragua, Stroman allowed just one run on two hits over 4.2 innings. He struck out two and walked no one.

This a game thread.