Coma shuts out Challengers, assures Challengers of 4th place

Coma and the Barracudas made sure in the first game of Saturday's doubleheader that they would finish ahead of their crosstown rivals Challengers in the standings.

Nderim Coma delievered another masterpiece with a 4-0 shutout of the league's best offensive team. He walked six and gave up three hits while striking out none for his fourth win of the season.

He outdueled Thomas Burger, who struck out a season-high 11 batters.

Burger picked up his first loss of the season, allowing four runs - only one of them earned - on six hits and just one base-on-balls.

A two-base error by center fielder Harry Bregy in the fourth inning opened the score for the Cudas. After both Marc Schnyder and Manuel Hirtz reached on an error, Bregy misjudged Coma's line drive and let it roll back to the fence.

Strahil Georgiev's run-scoring ground out a batter later doubled the Barracudas' lead.

Another unearned run crossed the plate in the next inning on Hirtz's RBI-single, and Chris Hyatt's RBI-single in the seventh frame wrapped up the game's scores.

With that loss, the Challengers cannot finish better than 12-8, giving them a virtual tie with the Barracudas and the Reussbuhl Eagles. But since both teams are 3-1 against the Challengers, they are classified higher in the standings, assuring the Challengers fourth place for a second consecutive season.

Game notes
The last shutout against the Challengers came on July 18, 2004 against the Therwil Flyers in a 7-0 loss. ...The only other time the Challengers collected three or less hits came on April 30, also against Coma and the Barracudas.