Challengers outslugged and sent to Relegation Round

After the morning's loss, the chances for the NLB-team to reach the Promotion Round had decreased, but were still existing.

	Chris Hardy homered twice in the game.

Under the eyes of their new head-coach Stanley Scott the Challengers missed these chances with a terrible defensive performance and a high loss in Game 2.

With a record of 2-6, they are now set for the Relegation Round against the Romanshorn Submarines, the Uzwil Helvetics and probably the Hünenberg Unicorns.

The Zürich Barracudas, for their part, didn't show mercy and buried their opponents with a smashing 14-run third inning.

The Challengers made it easy for their rivals to get into the second game of the day.

Orlando Balbuena missed a fly ball in right field, Chris Hardy let a ball roll past him in center and couldn't keep a fly ball in his glove at the short center field fence just minutes later.

It all happened within the first four batters of the game and all of them scored.

The Challengers' lead-off-hitter gave the answer himself by homering off pitcher Yusuf Isik in his first at-bat.

Thomas Blank followed with a two-run-homer, and in the next inning, Hardy mirrored his shot with Willy Schaub on for his third home-run of the season to tie the game at five runs.

But like in Game 1, the tie didn't last long, as the Challengers' pitching got in trouble for the first time in the season.

Starter Schaub, not at his usual level, gave up three doubles, a single and two base-on-balls for six runs without getting a single out, and had to be relieved by Manuel Schretzmann.

The latter showed solid pitching, but wasn't much of an obstacle for the unleashed Barracudas' offense.

Schretzmann eventually got out of the inning, giving up eight runs on six hits and three walks.

After that inning the game was decided, namely with the theatre of error-pain now starting again.

After few opportunities in the Barracudas' slugfest, the Challengers' defense committed seven more errors the rest of the game.

Save for Roger Burger, who had been taken out of the game early, every Challenger playing contributed his part to the total of ten errors.

After that devastating inning, it was again Oliver Labhart who stepped on the mound, and things went better for him than in Game 1.

He fanned four batters and didn't give the Barracudas much more to hit. Nevertheless they scored another five runs, none of them earned.

The Challengers drove in two more runs in these final four innings with RBI's by Labhart, Blank, Adrian Kämpfer">Adrian Kämpfer and Schretzmann with a sac fly.

Game notes
Thomas Blank hit his 11th NLB-homer in the first inning. He now leads the alltime list in front of Tobias Siegrist. With the same hit he also scored his 100th run in the NLB and is now fourth on the alltime list, only behind Harry Bregy's 146 and Ueli Von Burg's and Kämpfer's 107. He also recorded his 150th total base by doubling in the sixth inning. ...The two RBI's Kämpfer collected late in the game give him 80 in his career and the lead on the Challengers' NLB alltime list. His single in the fifth inning gave him 100 total bases in the NLB.