Challengers drop opener 6-3

The Bern Cardinals took Game 1 of this year's Finals with a 6-3 win over the Challengers.

The Cards scored early and held on, thanks mainly to a fine pitching performance by Severin Fries who picked up his 10th win of the season.

Starter Harry Bregy gave up three walks to start the game, and all three runners came around.

Only one of those runs was earned as shortstop Patrick Zöllig mishandled Ron Zimmermann's grounder, pushing Christoph Beyeler and John Baum over the plate.

While the Challengers found no recipe against Baum and reliever Fries from the third inning on, the Cards kept threatening by putting runners in scoring position in the second inning and scoring their fourth run in the bottom of the fourth inning.

Angelo Rodriguez' sac fly to center field scored Imboden from third.

The Challengers' first run also came on a sac fly as Anubis Benitez reached on a throwing error by third baseman Rodriguez, advanced to third on a passed ball and eventually scored as Chris Palatinus connected off Fries to center field.

The Challengers came within one run in the top of the fifth inning as Saentis Zeller hit an RBI-single and Tobias Siegrist's run-scoring ground out cut the Cards' lead to 4-3.

But the Cards got one run back on Sandro Negro's RBI-single, giving him a game-high three RBI's.

The Challengers went down in order in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings, leaving them questioning against Fries.

In the bottom of the seventh inning, the Cardinals added an insurance run after reliever Thomas Landis hit Raphael Hänzi with a pitch to force in a run.

Baum took over for the final inning, but he wasn't as sharp as expected.

Benitez led off with a single through the left side of the infield, and Palatinus worked the count full before drawing a base-on-balls.

With the tying run at the plate, Baum struck out both Landis and Bregy, before issuing another walk to light-hitting Ramon Perez, giving the Challengers a loaded diamond for the first time in the game.

Patrick Zöllig represented the winning tun, but after working the count full, he was caught looking at a third strike to end the game.

Game notes
Palatinus' sac fly was his 30th sacrifice of his career.