KT Secures Regular Season Championship, Advancing Straight to Korean Series After 5 Years

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Professional baseball team KT has secured the regular season championship and advanced straight to the Korean Series for the first time in five years.

Reporter Bae Jeonghun has the details.

[Reporter]

KT gained early momentum by scoring seven runs, starting with Hilliard's RBI double in the first inning, followed by a three-run homer from Jang Jun-won.

With Jang Jun-won's second home run of the game in the sixth inning and Ahn Hyun-min's clinching solo shot in the seventh, alongside starting pitcher Logan's dominant performance of eight shutout innings with 14 strikeouts, KT cruised to a 9-0 victory over Lotte.

Staying at the stadium with their home fans to watch the result of second-place Samsung's game, the players hugged and cheered when their regular season title was confirmed, popping champagne to celebrate the joy of victory.

[Lee Kang-cheol / KT Manager: When this season started, honestly, we didn't really think about first place. I think we were able to win thanks to the support of our fans, who helped us surpass one million attendance this year. Thank you very much.]

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In the match-up between third-place KIA and fourth-place LG, KIA smiled for the third consecutive day thanks to a dramatic home run by Kim Do-young.

Trailing 4-3 in the top of the ninth inning with two outs and runners on first and second, Kim Do-young hit a dramatic, go-ahead three-run home run over the left-field wall off a tight inside fastball from LG's Go Woo-suk.

With this dramatic reverse-sweep homer, Kim Do-young hit his 42nd home run of the season, reclaiming sole possession of the home run lead. Third-place KIA secured a 6-4 victory, extending its gap over fourth-place LG to one game and boosting its chances of advancing straight to the semi-playoffs.

LG, which conceded the decisive runs in the ninth inning of all three games in the series against KIA and suffered its eighth straight loss, now finds itself chased by fifth-place Doosan within a two-game margin.

Professional baseball recorded a cumulative attendance of 12.36 million this season, breaking the all-time single-season attendance record just one year later.

[Video Editing: Lee Jae-sung]

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