Challengers take opener 5-4

The Challengers took an early 5-0 lead in Game 1 of the Playoff Semifinals against the Zürich Barracudas that almost collapsed in just one inning.

Thomas Landis pitched a shutout for seven innnings before allowing four runs in the bottom of the eighth inning.

But the Challengers hung on for a 5-4 victory, taking a 1-0 lead in the best-of-five Series.

Landis picked up where he left after his last two games, allowing only a single run in his last 14 innings pitched.

Only Ueli Von Burg (twice) and Farid Bekkali reached as far as third base, but none of them scored.

Landis' offense continued to nibble at Von Burg's pitches, getting small hits like Anubis Benitez' RBI-single, Thomas Blank's RBI-double and a sac fly by Landis to score three unanswered runs in the first three innings.

They scored one run each in the fifth and sixth inning on a costly throwing error by Von Burg and another sac fly by Nick Lehmann.

And both those runs turned out to be huge because of what followed in the bottom of the eighth inning.

	Oli Labhart picked up his first career save in the NLA.

After a 1-2-3 seventh, Landis started to tire, and the Barracudas finally had him timed.

Von Burg led off with a double and Hirtz plated him with an RBI-single.

James Sanders reached on a hit-by-pitch before Bekkali finally struck out for the first out.

But Nderim Coma hit a single to make Landis' day.

Oliver Labhart relieved Landis for just his second appearance of the season.

But Labhart wasn't rusty at all.

Although both Sanders and Coma scored on a throwing error and a passed ball by catcher Tobias Siegrist, Labhart got Jose Tiburcio and pinch-hitter Stähli to fly out to end the inning.

And with a perfect 1-2-3 inning, Labhart picked up his first save in the NLA to secure the Challengers' win.

Game notes
For the first time since May 24, 2003, Landis (6-5) didn't give up a base-on-balls, and it helped him and his defense. ...Landis also hit his 150th NLA-double in the first inning. ...Lehmann has tied Manny Marchant for 7th place on the alltime list for runs by scoring his 185th run in the third inning.