EXL: Draci advance to TOP 6. Technika with only a hypothetical chance

The last round of Extraliga regular season started on Friday. After today we now know 4 teams that will play in TOP 6.

Draci Brno – Eagles Praha 8-2

Draci had a surprisingly easy game against the top Extraliga team. Especially considering Eagles started Samuel Steigert, who had a great complete game against Arrows in the previous week. However, home team started aggressively, winning 7-0 after 3 innings. Martin Kalábek continues his hot streak, adding 4 RBI and another HR.

Jhenderson Hurtado also had a good game, when he had 13 SO in 6 innings, only allowing 1 hits. Eagles only became a threat once bullpen came in play. Visitors scored 2 runs against young Tomáš Urbánek and Václav Tauš. Jackson Solarte finished the last inning with 3 stirkeouts.

Eagles also saw 15 year old Filip Němec pitch his first Extraliga game, who threw an inning without allowing an out and striking out 2 batters.

Draci won 8-2 and are currently on 4 game winning streak. They can still, hypothetically, finish first. Eagles dropped to the 2nd place after the loss and are now only one place ahead of Draci.

Arrows Ostrava – Tempo Praha 2-6

Tempo also has a 4 win sterak. They didn’t start well in northern Moravia, after home team scored 2 runs against them in the first inning. However, afterwards we got to see a Venezuelan concert on the mound, when Adonai Gutierrez Goyo and Jhony Duran didn’t allow any more runs for the rest of the game.

Ondřej Satoria kept his opponents scoreless until the 4th inning. Filip Smola then blasted his first homerun of the season and lowered Arrows lead to 1. An inning later Šimon Drápela scored in the second run and Tempo finished their comeback in the sixth inning with a double steal.

Martin Červenka lost his hitting streak, however, as he “only” got 2 walks. He doesn’t need to be disappointed, as his team got much closer to TOP 6 after the win. Prague team can ensure their spot on Saturday at home. On the other hand Ostrava is in much tighter spot, as they dropped outside TOP 6.

Sokol Hluboká – Technika Brno 10-1

The battle between the last two teams brought a smooth win for south Bohemians. They started Alec Lemmon, who gave them 6 innings without an allowed run. He also added 10 SO. When Michal Cajz substituted him, Sokol was already leading 7-0.

Technika didn’t get a payoff from Parker Thode, as visitors were able to read his pitched and in the end they got 9 hits off of him. Martin Mužík was especially active in the offense, earning 3 hits. Matěj Vlach‘s triple in the 4th inning earned him 3 RBI as the bases were loaded. He finished with 4 RBI in the end.

Sokol entered this important series in the best way possible. The loss complicated the situation for Technika. Brno team know they can’t afford to lose any more games, but they will also need to hope for favorable results from their opponents.

Třebíč Nuclears – Hroši Brno 10-13 (F/11)

We could see an interesting Czech pitching duel at Vysočina. Both teams exchanged leads for the final resolution to come in extra innings. Both Tomáš Ondra and Lukáš Hlouch gave their teams chance to win, as they both striked out 7 batters.

But extra innings got pretty wild. Visitors first took 9-6 lead in the 10th inning, for the home team to tie the game. Hroši had a good 11th inning against Ryan Johnson, scoring 4 runs. Russel Strilchuk scored in 1 run in the bottom half of the inning, but this wasn’t enough for Nuclears to get the win.

Hroši utilized mainly the second half of their lineup. Klimeš, Nový and Schwarzinger at 7-9 positions had 9 hits and 10 RBI, making a large contribution to Hroši’s win. After Eagles lost their game, Brno team is now back at the top of Extraliga table and are now sure to play in TOP 6.

Tempo, Hluboká, Arrows and Technika will battle for the 2 remaining spots.

Extraliga Table

#	Team		W	L	T	PCT	GB
1		HRO Hroši	10	6	0	.625	0
2		EAG Eagles	11	8	0	.579	0.5
3		DRA Draci	10	8	0	.556	1
4		NUC Nuclears	10	9	0	.526	1.5
5		TEM Tempo	9	9	0	.500	2
6		HLU Hluboká	8	9	1	.472	2.5
7		ARR Arrows	7	10	1	.417	3.5
8		TEC Technika	6	12	0	.333	5