Challengers advance to Finals with 15-6 victory over Cards in Game 3

The Challengers qualified for their second consecutive Swiss Finals by beating the Bern Cardinals 15-6 in Game 3 of their Semifinal Series.

	Benny Räber collected his sixth win of the season by pitching 7 1-3 innings, giving up six runs - two of them earned - on seven hits and six walks. He also struck out five.

The Challengers' quick 3-0 lead after the first inning that came on Thomas Landis' RBI-double and rookie Tobias Siegrist's two-run double, slowly faded away in the top of the second as the Cards profited from three errors to score three unearned runs off starter Benny Räber.

But the Challengers came back in the bottom of the third ininng, and sent 11 batters to the plate that scored seven runs.

Chris Palatinus started the scoring with a two-run single with the bases loaded, Anubis Benitez followed with an RBI-double, his 14th of the season, Palatinus scored on Severin Fries' balk, Landis hit a two-run homer, and Siegrist capped the scoring with an RBI-single to give his team a comfortable 10-3 lead after just three innings.

	Jose Valdez tied Adris Linares' record for homers in a single season by hitting his 22nd homer in the eighth inning.

The Cardinals seemed to be desperate to score a run afterwards as they had just five baserunners in the next four innings, scoring no more runs off Räber.

Räber (6-4) picked up his career-high sixth win of the season by pitching 7 1-3 innings, giving up just two earned runs on seven hits, walking six and striking out five. He also lowered his ERA to 4.68.

In the meantime, the Challengers extended their lead in the fifth and sixth innings on RBI-doubles by Manny Marchant and Benitez.

	Nick Lehmann went just 1-for-6 and dropped his batting average to .448.

In the top of the eighth, Räber started to get tired and was lifted in favor of reliever Landis after allowing a single to catcher Marco Haas.

Landis pitched the final 1 2-3 innings, allowing just a single baserunner on a fielding error, striking out three batters.

The Challengers scored their last runs in the bottom of the eighth inning as Jose Valdez hit a two-run homer to deep center field. It was his 22nd homer of the season and tied Adris Linares' record mark of 22 four baggers in a single season, set back in 1994. Valdez also hit his 17th double and stole his 15th base of the season.

The Challengers will now face the Therwil Flyers in Therwil next Saturday in Game 1 of the Swiss Finals. The Flyers had a 24-4 record in the regular season and swept the Embrach Rainbows in the Semifinals to advance to the Finals for the first time since 1997.

The Challengers and Flyers split their season series 2-2, with the Flyers winning the first two games in Zurich, and then losing twice in Therwil.

Game Notes:
Landis tied Enrico Zingg for most career doubles at 67 by hitting his 20th double of the season in the first ininng. ...The Challengers hit a total of seven doubles in the game, three alone by Benitez. ...The season record of 52 hits set by Adris Linares in 1994 and tied by Landis in 1997, was surpassed by three players today. First, Landis broke it in the bottom of the fifth with a single, then Valdez also followed with a single, and Benitez also broke the old mark by hitting a double in the bottom of the sixth.