A late rally wasn’t enough to salvage the opener of the Junior Softball World Series for the Kirkland All-Star team, which dropped an 8-5 pool play loss to Canada on Sunday at Everest Park in Kirkland.

Canada (1-1) took a 4-0 lead in the bottom of the second inning, keeping everything on the ground and slipping hits through the infield.

Kirkland (0-1) tied the game at five runs apiece in the top of the fifth inning on an RBI from Sasha Mitchell and two errors by Canada, scoring Haley Brown and Mitchell.

Canada drew a fly ball to left field in the bottom of the fifth inning to score two runs, and scored a third on a hit batter with the bases loaded.

Kirkland starter Jane Wilson threw a complete game, going six innings with nine hits, seven earned runs and three strikeouts. Canada used three pitchers, Emma Bolzonello, Zoe Lott and Gianna Wade, none of which threw more than three innings.

Lott and Taylor Chenard each finished with two RBIs for Canada. Brown had three hits and an RBI for Kirkland.

Continuing the four-game pool play slate, Kirkland is scheduled to play the Asia-Pacific team at 10:45 a.m. on Monday, August 1 at Everest Park.

Update from Day One:

Canada was the busiest team in Pool B, beating the host team and losing to USA Central, 7-6 on Sunday. USA Southeast beat Asia-Pacific, 6-1, on Sunday. The two teams are tied for the lead in Pool B, and are slated to play at 1:45 p.m. on Monday afternoon.

Latin America leads Pool A with two wins so far: A 10-6 win over USA Southwest and an 11-0 win over Europe-Africa. In the other Pool A game, USA West beat USA East, 10-1.

The top four teams in each pool move on to elimination play.