Challengers upset by Eagles in home opener, 11-4

The Lucerne Eagles spoiled the Challengers' 2014 home opener by scoring early off newly acquired Ryan Byrne en route to an 11-4 win.

Tobias Siegrist led the offense with three hits in four at-bats, and Eidrys Reyes also added three hits, but five different Eagle batters collected two hits each in a 13-hit attack.

The Eagles also stole five bases off batterymates Byrne and Bryan Shemley, and three errors in the field didn’t make matters easier, either.

The first two batters of the game reached on an error by second baseman Reyes and a base-on-balls, a couple of stolen bases, a wild pitch, an error and a single later, the Eagles were off to a 2-0 start.

The Challengers got one run back on Jesus Martinez’ RBI-single, but that was all the Challengers could muster against former Challenger Andrea Girasole.

Girasole would end up pitching seven innings in which he’d give up only one single earned run on six hits and two walks, while also striking out five.

The Challengers were able to put runners on base, but failed over and over again to cash in. They had runners at third base with one out three times and failed to get them in all three times.

By the middle of the ninth inning, the Eagles built up an 11-1 lead. By that time head coach Chris Palatinus was tossed by base umpire Urs Köstinger after arguing a questionable call regarding the use of relief pitchers and coaches who touch the rubber in between innings.

The Challengers put up three runs in the bottom of the ninth off reliever Stefan Haltmeier for the final score of 11-4.

Game notes
The Challengers had just one extra-base hit, an RBI-double by Siegrist in the ninth inning, while the Eagles had five. …Bregy scored his 250th run in the NLA by crossing the plate in the ninth inning on Siegrist’s RBI-double.