The marquee semifinal matchup of the World Baseball Classic is set after the United States national baseball team and Dominican Republic national baseball team both advanced Friday night, setting up a high-stakes showdown to determine who will play for the tournament championship.

Team USA secured its spot in the semifinals with a 5–3 victory over Canada national baseball team, while the Dominican Republic advanced after mercy-ruling the South Korean national baseball team 10–0 in seven innings.

San Francisco Giants right-hander Logan Webb led the Americans on the mound, throwing 4⅔ shutout innings while allowing four hits and striking out five over 71 pitches. His performance helped the United States build an early lead before surviving a late Canadian rally.

Team USA opened the scoring in the first inning when Kyle Schwarber drove in a run with a groundout. The Americans added two more runs in the third after a throwing error by Canadian third baseman Abraham Toro sailed past first baseman Josh Naylor with the bases loaded.

The lead grew to 5–0 in the sixth inning when Brice Turang and Pete Crow-Armstrong delivered RBI singles.

Canada pushed back late. An RBI single from Tyler Black cut the deficit, and catcher Bo Naylor followed with a two-run home run off reliever Gabe Speier to pull Canada within two runs.

In the eighth inning, reliever David Bednar faced a major threat after allowing two infield singles and a passed ball that left runners on second and third with no outs. Bednar escaped the jam by retiring Naylor on a popout, striking out Tyler O'Neill, and getting rookie Owen Caissie to chase a splitter for the third out.

Relievers Garrett Whitlock and Mason Miller closed out the final six outs to secure the win.

The semifinal will feature a marquee pitching matchup as Team USA plans to start ace Paul Skenes. With pitch limits expanding to 95 pitches in the semifinals and finals, Skenes will face one of the most dangerous lineups in the tournament.

The Dominican Republic’s offense has dominated the competition, scoring 51 runs through five games while batting .312/.453/.637 as a team. The lineup has also tied the World Baseball Classic record with 14 home runs.

While the Dominicans have surged offensively, the American lineup has struggled to find consistency. After scoring 24 runs in its first two games against Brazil and Great Britain, Team USA has produced runs in spurts rather than sustained rallies in later rounds.

The winner of Sunday night’s matchup will advance to the World Baseball Classic championship game.