Challengers drop opener 10-2

The Therwil Flyers showed the Challengers why they finished the regular season in first place.

With timely hitting, a solid pitching performance and a good defense, they won the opener of the best-of-5 Semifinals 10-2.

Stefan Koller went 3-for-5, Sam Faeder had two hits and two RBI's, and Lucas Croton pitched seven innings to pick up the win. He allowed two runs on seven hits and three walks, while also striking out three.

After two scoreless innings, the Flyers broke through against Tobias Siegrist on Koller's RBI-single with two outs.

An inning later, they put four unanswered runs on the board on RBI-singles by Chris Blackbee and Seppi Zwyer, and Takanobu Oshima's two-run single.

Croton and Siegrist kept exchanging zeros on the board in the fifth and sixth innings, before the Challengers finally scored their first run in the seventh on Yonimiler Martinez' RBI-single.

Angel Maduro followed with an RBI-single to cut the Flyers' lead to 5-2.

But the Flyers got both runs back on a throwing error by catcher James Sanders to third base in an attempt to catch Sam Faeder stealing. The throw sailed wide into left field, scoring Faeder and putting Blackbee on third. He went on to score on a wild pitch by Siegrist.

Coach Faeder then summoned Adrian Kaufmann to close out the game, and he just did so in convincing fashion. He retired the side in order in the top of the eighth, and only allowed Jesus Martinez to reach on a walk.

The Flyers' infield turned a 4-6-3 double play, the third on the day, to finish the game.

Game 2 is in Embrach on August 30 at 3pm.

Game notes
The 2-3-4 batters in the Challengers' lineup went a combined 0-for-11 with two strikeouts and a GIDP. ...With his ground-rule double in the seventh inning, Palatinus reached 600 total bases in the NLA.