This is the first time Australia has outplayed the USA, the world's second ranked team, in a flagship World Cup tournament or the Olympic Games.

Australia was victorious at the Tokyo Dome, and earned its first win of the Premier 12 Super Round.

And it was a stellar performance by Mid-North Coast junior starting pitcher Tim Atherton, who led the way for an exciting win.

Atherton was a young star on the Hastings baseball circuit as a junior.

"It's a great feeling for us, but is also an expected feeling," Atherton said at the post-game press conference after the opening round.

"We came to this tournament with this expectation in mind and now we're just executing what we did during the last six months.

"It took great performances in every aspect: pitching, defence and offence.

"I wouldn't have the confidence to throw the pitches I wanted unless I have the defence picking me up, and the offence doing the job at the start of the game scoring two runs."

Australian skipper David Nilsson agreed.

"I think it was a very good game. We've been playing good baseball and pitching very well as a team. It was just about getting some runs," Nilsson said.

"Those early runs in the first inning put some extra pressure on this talented USA team. We played sensational defence, some great plays at third base, some good plays in the outfield, and then our pitching did an incredible job."

USA manager Scott Brosius wasn't surprised by the development of the game.

"We knew Australia was going to be a tough game, they've been very competitive every game they've played in this Premier 12, so we knew that it would be a very tight, close game. It was just a bit disappointing that we couldn't score enough runs to win," he said.

Atherton said having a solid game plan played in his favour.

"My catcher and I worked well together. We established the fastball on both sides of the plate, I didn't want the USA team swinging on it, so when we knew they were swinging, we went with the off-speed pitches," he explained.

"It was just staying aggressive, I gave up a couple of walks but stayed aggressive with the fastball, especially with the back of a great defence behind me."

This win put Australia in the hunt for an Olympic spot but it wasn't meant to be as the tournament wrapped up.

The Aussie squad finished without earning a spot in the bronze medal match. The team will now look at alternative pathways to gain qualification to the Olympics.