Barracudas rally in final inning, force Game 5 with 8-6 win

The Challengers and Zürich Barracudas fought another epic battle in which the Barracudas came out as winners after 11 grueling innings.

	Harry Bregy had a record four hits in six at-bats.

At 5:40, Anubis Benitez was tagged out at home for the final out, and the two teams will now play a fifth game, whose winner will advance to the Finals.

Although the Challengers outhit their opponents 13-10, they couldn’t overcome closer James Sanders’ strong performance and their six errors in the field, and eventually lost 8-6 after 3 hours and 35 minutes.

Thomas Landis and Ueli Von Burg again started for their teams, and the Cudas opened the scoring in the second inning.

Landis hit three batters in a row in the second inning, and catcher Tobias Siegrist’s throwing error enabled Frank Berchtold to score from second base on Martin Strzodka’s ground out to third.

Von Burg’s RBI-single brought home the second run for the Barracudas before Manuel Hirtz finally grounded out for the final out of the inning.

The Challengers answered in the bottom of the third inning.

Patrick Zöllig and Harry Bregy reached on back-to-back singles, and a successful first-and-third steal play put the Challengers on board.

Siegrist’s RBI-double and a wild pitch by Von Burg gave the Challengers the lead.

	Patrick Zöllig hit his first double since July 3, also against the Barracudas.

They extended their lead in the next two innings by scoring one run each in the fourth and fifth innings.

Bregy and Siegrist both hit RBI-singles, and the latter chased Von Burg.

In came Nderim Coma who was able to finish the inning without further damage.

He also opened the sixth inning, but after Bregy reached on a single, the Barracudas went back to their season-long strategy and brought closer Sanders.

Showing no faith in their homegrown pitchers and relying completely on Sanders’ phenomenal pitching, the Barracudas shortened their regular season games to four innings this season as Sanders was almost unhittable when he came in to close games.

Nothing different in this game and the whole Series throughout, Von Burg and Coma were given quick hooks after just five innings although they didn’t always perform that bad.

In the meantime, Landis bounced back from his horrible second inning, and allowed just three baserunners since then.

With two outs and a 5-2 lead in the seventh inning, Hirtz and Sanders reached with consecutive singles.

Farid Bekkali then followed with a lazy pop fly to right field that could have ended the inning, but rarely-used right fielder Adrian Kämpfer">Adrian Kämpfer didn’t manage to position himself under the ball in time, letting it drop for an error and enabling one run to score.

	James Sanders not only pitched almost perfectly, he also hurt the Challengers with his bat.

Landis couldn’t recover and walked Coma before Berchtold’s RBI-double tied the game.

Fabian Monn flied out to deep left field for the third out, but the game now caught new fire on a miserable and rainy afternoon.

Bregy relieved Landis to start the eighth inning, and Miguel Conde’s single was the only hit he gave up that inning.

In the bottom half of the eighth, substitute Manuel Schretzmann faced Sanders to lead off the inning.

Schretzmann shortened his swing and managed to sneak a grounder past third baseman Coma for a single.

Schretzmann then easily stole second and third, and at the plate was Bregy who already had three singles in the game.

The Challengers kept playing small ball, and Bregy laid down a perfect bunt back to the mound which Sanders couldn’t handle, enabling Schretzmann to score the go-ahead run.
Benitez struck out for the second out but Landis was walked to put runners at first and second with two outs.

Up came Siegrist who hit a double off Sanders in the last inning, but this time, he lined to second baseman Conde for the third out.

The Barracudas faced elimination in the top of the ninth inning, but they weren’t about to give up.

Sanders reached on third baseman Chris Palatinus’ throwing error, and Bekkali’s double quickly put two runners in scoring position with no outs.

Bregy got Coma to swing at a third strike, but Siegrist had to throw to first base after dropping the pitch.

Sanders was waiting at third, and broke for home as soon as Siegrist fired to first.

First baseman Chris Hardy couldn’t throw back to the plate in time, enabling the Barracudas to tie the game once again.

But Bekkali was caught in a rundown after Sanders scored, and he was tagged out by third baseman Palatinus after two throws.

Berchtold grounded out to shortstop for the final out, and the Challengers had a chance to win it in the bottom of the ninth.

But Sanders retired all three batters he faced in that inning, and the game went into extra innings.

The Barracudas wasted a huge scoring opportunity in the top of the tenth inning.

With Monn standing at second base with no outs, Conde tried to lay down a bunt, but instead popped the ball up into the Bregy's glove, who took the ball and fired it to second base to double off Monn who had already taken too big of a lead.

After another walk to Strahil Georgiev, Von Burg struck out swinging to end the threat.

	The two teams had no presents for each other and gave everything.

Another 1-2-3 inning gave the Challengers and their coaching staff little sign of hope to be able to ever score off Sanders.

Bregy started the 11th inning by striking out Hirtz.

But Sanders, who already swings a hot bat, took a line drive over the right center field fence for a solo homer and a 7-6 Barracuda lead.

After another walk, Landis again came in to relieve.

He struck out Coma for the second out, but a walk to Berchtold kept the inning going.

Palatinus’ inability to handle Monn’s line drive enabled Bekkali to score an insurance run.

A strikeout to Conde finally ended the inning.

In the bottom half of the inning, the Challengers started off with a hit-by-pitch to Benitez.

Landis flied out to left for the first out, and then the Challengers’ coaching staff started to calculate.

There’s a rule in Switzerland which states that Swiss pitchers have to pitch at least five innings of a nine-inning game, and the rest can be pitched by foreign players.

Coaches Palatinus and Kämpfer misinterpreted the rule, thinking that Swiss pitchers have to pitch more than a foreign pitcher, independent from the number of innings.

So if Sanders would get another out, the game would be forfeited to the Challengers.

So they thought.

Siegrist was given the sacrifice bunt sign, which he executed perfectly. Benitez went to second and kept running to third. He was safe as the Barracuda defense tried but didn’t manage to throw him out.

He even rounded third base, but was finally tagged out by catcher Georgiev, ending the game, but in favor of the Barracudas.

The Challengers were informed afterwards about the correct ruling and they had to take that bitter loss.

Game 5 will now decide who will advance to the Finals.

Will it be the fifth trip in the last seven seasons for the Challengers, or will the Barracudas return to the big showdown for the first time since 1998?

The game will take place at the Heerenschürli on October 2 at 2pm.

Game notes
Harry Bregy tied his career highs for at-bats and hits as he went 4-for-6 with four singles. …It was the first time that a Challengers team played 11 innings in the last 11 seasons.