Challengers rally for 7-6 win in opener

The Challengers continue to dominate the winners of the regular season, the Sissach Frogs, by beating them 7-6 in Saturday's opener of this year's Semifinals.

It wasn't easy though, as the Frogs came back from a 5-0 deficit to take a 6-5 lead, but the Challengers answered with two runs in the eighth inning for the win.

Harry Bregy went 7 2-3 innings - his longest outing since pitching eight innings against the Therwil Flyers on April 30 -, picking up the win and breaking his 3-game losing streak.

His performance was saved by Anthony Bennett who pitched the final 1 1-3 innings for his third save of the season.

Although the Frogs outhit the Challengers 10-6, their four errors and the nine walks given up were too much to overcome.

The Challengers batted around in the second inning, scoring four times off ace Claudio Heim.

Another run in the top of the fourth inning extended their lead to 5-0 thanks to Bennett's RBI-single.

In the next inning, Brandon Neal apparently pulled a muscle in his thigh trying to field a bunted ball by Patrick Zöllig. He was replaced by oldtimer Peter Rüfenacht in the next inning. Up to that point, Neal had two of his team's five hits with a single and a double.

In the bottom of the fifth, the Frogs managed to score their first run off Bregy on Alessandro Traina's sac fly to right field, but Daniel Traina grounded into a fielder's choice to end the inning.

But the Frogs kept scoring in the next inning.

Bregy managed to get two outs with runners on third and second, but he walked the bases full with a free pass to Rüfenacht.

Markus Schaffner followed with an RBI-single, and Heim drilled the next offering by Bregy into left center field for a three-run double, tying the game at five all.

And Alessandro Traina gave his team the lead with an RBI-single.

In the next inning, Johnny Bassett came on trying to close out the game.

He did OK in his first inning, allowing only two baserunners in the seventh, but things got out of hand as he hit Adrian Kämpfer">Adrian Kämpfer to lead off the eighth, and then drilling Zöllig two batters later.

Bassett then tried to pick Kämpfer off second base, but his throw sailed into center field for an error, sending Kämpfer to third base.

Center fielder Heim picked up the ball and tried to nail Kämpfer at third base, but his throw sailed over third baseman Daniel Traina's head into the dugout, giving Kämpfer an extra base to score the tying run.

Saentis Zeller then chased Bassett by getting an RBI-single for his team's lead.

Daniel Traina was again summoned on to the mound, and he started by walking the first two batters.

But after that, he retired the final four batters.

Bregy started the eighth inning by striking out Stefan Wick and Rüfenacht, but then walked Schaffner, ending his day on the hill.

In came rookie Thomas Burger, and on his second pitch, drilled Heim between his shoulder blades.

That prompted coach Bennett to take him out and put himself on the mound to get the save.

He just did that by retiring the final four batters he faced. Pinch-hitter Speck lined out to first baseman Bregy to end the game.

With that Series opener win, the Challengers have now won their last four Game 1 in the Playoff Semifinals.

Game notes
Bennett's save was his first since April 30 against the Flyers. ...Kämpfer struck out in his 50th at-bat in the NLA in the third inning. ...Bregy's strikeout against Wick was his 150th of his NLA-career.