South Zone captain Aaron Jones blazed his way to a 56-ball century, his second hundred in two days, to put his side one step closer to the tournament final at the 2024 USA Cricket Men's 45-over National Championship in California. 

Photo credit: Peter Della Penna

By Peter Della Penna in Los Angeles (Twitter/X @PeterDellaPenna)
 
Former USA vice-captain Aaron Jones continued his ruthless batting display at 2024 USA Cricket Men’s 45-over National Championship on Wednesday by following up his day one century with another triple-figure score that came at a rate nearly twice as fast as his first hundred as the middle-order batter pushed South Zone to a 2-0 record in group play with a 138-run win over USA Red Squad on Wednesday afternoon at Woodley Park in Van Nuys, California. 
 
Jones took 98 balls to reach the century mark on day one after entering at No. 3 in the second over of a successful chase against Midwest. On day two, he pushed himself down to No. 6 in order to give less experienced players an opportunity to showcase their skills. He eventually arrived in the 16^th over at 55 for 4 and proceeded to torch a rapidly deflated group of USA Red bowlers during a 138-run partnership with Utkarsh Srivastava. Jones was responsible for 74% of the runs in the stand as Srivastava was on 15 when the partnership began. But Jones passed him by the end of the 23^rd over when he hit former USA U19 captain Rishi Ramesh’s legspin for four and six to move to 37. He further terrorized Ramesh in the 25^th, blasting a four and three sixes to begin a 23-run over that took him to a 35-ball half-century. 
 
Jones didn’t slow down on his march to triple-digits, taking just 15 more balls to move into the 90s before a Srivastava boundary in the 30^th brought up a 64-ball half-century. Jones started the 31^st on strike with a dot before pulling a six over midwicket to move to 98, then cut a four wide of the cover sweeper to reach a 56-ball century having taken just 21 balls to go from 50 to 100. He fell on the following delivery for 102, skying a drive to point inside the circle. 
 
Srivastava eventually pushed on to finish with 77 off 94 balls before he fell in the 40^th over as South ended on 287 for 8. USA Red’s chase got off to a poor start with both openers run out in the first five overs, including Rehman Dar who had made a half-century a day earlier against Southwest. Unmukt Chand revived the innings with 55 off 67 at No. 3 but had little support elsewhere and eventually was dismissed by Srivastava, who took 2 for 39 in nine overs of offspin. Legspinner Adam Khan claimed 3 for 29 as Red were eventually bowled out for 149 in the 34^th over. 
 
Southwest bowled out Midwest for 122 before chasing the total down with 20 overs to spare in a six-wicket win to set up a battle of unbeatens against South Zone in their half of the tournament draw. Harmeet Singh was named Player of the Match after the left-arm spinner took 3 for 19 in nine overs and also claimed two catches in the field. Midwest captain Fahad Babar top-scored with 36 at the top of the order and helped his side to a solid platform of 72 for 1 in the 17^th over. But Harmeet bowled Babar to spark a rapid collapse as Midwest lost their last nine wickets for 50 runs. Ali Sheikh followed up his unbeaten century from day one to close out the Southwest chase with an unbeaten 44 off 41 balls from the No. 5 batting slot including four fours and a six to top score for the winning side. 
 
In the opposite half of the draw, Mid Atlantic and West Zone both won their contests to remain undefeated and set up a de facto semi-final on Thursday. Mid Atlantic closed out a nervy three-wicket win over East Zone. After bowling out East for 143, Mid Atlantic nearly bungled what should have been a straightforward chase by falling to 87 for 7 before Sai Mukkamalla took charge to get his team across the line with an unbeaten 72 off 64 balls. With 14 runs needed to win, Mukkamalla swatted a neck high full toss no ball for six over fine leg, then slog swept the ensuing free hit over midwicket for another six to level the scores before tapping a single to mid-on for the winning run with 11.4 overs to spare. It wrapped up an unbroken 57-run partnership with tailender Stephen Wiig, who blocked out one end to finish 10 not out off 51 balls. 
 
That was the second significant contribution of the day for Wiig, who took 5 for 18 in the first innings with his left-arm pace. Wiig wiped out East’s top three with significant new-ball swing to leave the score at 7 for 3 after four overs before wrapping up his opening spell with the wicket of Imran Uddin in the 10^th to make it 30 for 4 as all four were out bowled or lbw. He later came back at the death to claim Rahim Dipu caught at mid-off to complete his five-wicket haul. Akeem Dodson provided the only resistance for East, top-scoring with 74 off 94 balls before he was dismissed by Ritwik Behera’s offspin in the 34^th over. That ended an 84-run stand in which he provided the overwhelming majority of the runs and his wicket began a slide of 5 for 8 to end the East innings in just 39 overs. 
 

West produced the most lopsided result of the day, crushing USA Blue by 10 wickets. USA Blue captain Sanjay Stanley top-scored with 25, but only two other players reached double-figures as they were bowled out for 89 in just 29.2 overs. Vedant Jain took 4 for 23 in 5.2 overs to lead West in the field while Abhishek Paradkar took 2 for 11 in five overs of left-arm pace. West captain Rahul Jariwala followed up a first-day duck by scoring 33 not out off 35 balls in the chase while Zahid Zakhil made 52 not out off 53 balls as the target was reached in just 14.4 overs. 
 
Tournament play resumes on Thursday at 9 am local time inside Woodley Park in Van Nuys. The winner of the South v Southwest match will face the winner of the Mid Atlantic v West Zone match in the tournament final on Friday. The loser of those two matches on Thursday will fall into the third place playoff on Friday. The winner of the Midwest v USA Red match will take on the winner of the East v USA Blue match in the fifth place playoff while the two losing sides will fall back into the last place playoff.