A late rally fell short and the Central East Maui All-Stars lost their opener in the Little League Baseball West Regional on Saturday in San Bernardino, Calif.

Angel Chavez struck out 14 and Rio Rico (Ariz.) held off Central East Maui in the bottom of the sixth in a 3-2 win at Al Houghton Stadium.

"To me, it’s a great eye-opener for us right now," Central East Maui coach Bernard Kaupe said.

Rio Rico (1-1) did all of its scoring in a three-run rally in the top of the fourth inning in support of Chavez, who took a perfect game into the sixth.

Only three Maui batters put the ball in play through 52⁄3 innings against Chavez before Kekoa Ostermiller broke up the perfect game with a walk.

With Chavez consistently getting ahead of the Maui hitters, Kaupe encouraged them to be more aggressive earlier in the count and Ka‘o Mindoro singled to center for Maui’s first hit.

"He came up with a big hit and that just motivated everybody," Kaupe said.

Nevan Watanabe walked to load the bases and Ostermiller scored on a wild pitch to Orion Miyasato-Farias. Mindoro then scored on Miyasato-Farias’ infield hit.

With runners on first and third, Cesar Dominguez relieved Chavez and got Kawena Alo-Kaonohi to ground to shortstop for a fielder’s choice to end it.

Central East Maui (0-1) plays Ocean View (Southern California) today at 5 p.m.