Barracudas use late-inning heroics to beat Challengers 15-11

The Zürich Barracudas scored six times in the closing innings to win 15-11 in Game 1 of Saturday's doubleheader against the Challengers.

	Thomas Landis had a game-high three hits, including the team's first two homers this season.

With that win, the Barrcaudas overcame three homers by Thomas Landis and Harry Bregy.

Two of those homers came off close James Sanders, but all three of them were solo shots.

The nine runs scored by the Barracudas in the first three innings were erased by the Challengers against starter Ueli Von Burg in the second, third and fourth innings.

RBI-singles by rookies Oliver Labhart and Adrian Kämpfer">Adrian Kämpfer, plus Anubis Benitez' two-run double accounted for the first four runs for the Challengers in the second inning.

The two runs scored by the Barracudas in the next inning were equaled by Landis' solo homer and Roger Brunner's steal of home.

In took until the fourth inning for starter Landis to settle down.

	Closer Sanders was handed the win by pitching three innings.

He then retired six batters in a row from the fourth through the sixth inning.

In the meantime, his offense kept nibbling away the Barracudas' lead.

Three more runs scored in the bottom of the fourth on Benitez' run-scoring ground out and Brunner's two-run double.

That made the day for Von Burg earlier than expected, and closer Sanders came on to relieve.

He quickly retired the next six batters, four of them on strikes.

But with two outs in sixth inning, Landis connected for his second homer of the game and of the season.

But the Barracudas had taken an 11-9 lead before that, scoring twice in the top of the sixth inning on Manuel Hirtz' RBI-double and Sanders' RBI-single.

Landis and the Challengers looked to be in good shape going into the seventh and final inning trailing only 11-10.

	Harry Bregy is congratulated by his teammates after his first homer in almost two years.

But Landis lost it as substitue right fielder Martinez connected for a two-run homer with two outs.

After walking the next batter, playing coach Chris Palatinus took away the ball from Landis and handed it over to Patrick Zöllig.

Zöllig made his first appearance on the mound for the Challengers this season, and it showed as the first four batters he faced reached on two walks, a hit-by-pitch and a single.

The 15-10 deficit in the middle of the seventh inning then was too much to overcome.

Nevertheless, Harry Bregy connected off Sanders for his first homer since August 31, 2002.

After getting Labhart to ground out for the second out, Sanders had to leave the mound in order to not violate the foreign pitcher's rule.

Nderim Coma came on and allowed the next two batters to reach, but that was all the Challengers had left, and the game was won by the Cudas 15-11.

Game notes
Landis' solo homer off Sanders in the sixth inning was his franchise-leading 500th hit of his career. He also received his 148th walk of his career in the fourth inning, putting him into a tie with Enrico Zingg for most career walks. ...Brunner's single in the third inning was his 200th hit in his NLA-career, good for seventh place on the alltime list.