(Thunder Bay, Ontario) — The Thunder Bay Border Cats captured their second Northwoods League Championship in franchise history with a thrilling 6-5 victory of the Madison Mallards Sunday night. The Border Cats win the best-of-three series two games to one.

The teams traded three-run innings late in the ballgame with Madison coming back from a 3-1 deficit to take a 4-3 lead in the seventh. They added a run on a Trent Soares (Fresno State) home run in the eighth to expand the lead to 5-3.

Thunder Bay has had late inning magic many times throughout the season, especially at Port Arthur Stadium, and Derek Wiley (Belmont) was the magician Sunday. Wiley, already having hit a two-run home run in the game, capped off a three-run eighth inning by driving in a run and having another score on his infield single. Madison shortstop Brandon Wikoff (Illinois) threw errantly to first base on Wiley’s ground ball in the eighth. Wiley was given an RBI infield single but a second run scored on the bad throw before Wiley was tagged out at second to end the inning.

Jimmy Stanley (Belmont) pitched a scoreless ninth inning to get his second save of the postseason. Northwoods League batting champion Rob Lyerly (Charlotte) flew out to centerfield to end the game.

Brett Holland (Texas-Tyler) earned the win out of relief to move to 2-0 in the playoffs. Matt Jansen (Purdue) pitched out of relief and allowed the three runs (two earned) in the eighth to get tagged with the loss. He went 1-1 in the playoffs.

Click here to listen to the “Daily Recap” for a descriptive audio recap of the game.

See the box score and full play-by-play of the game by clicking here.

Read the Madison Mallards recap of the game here.

Madison beat Thunder Bay 4-3 Saturday night to even the Northwoods League Championship Series at one game apiece. Andy Deain (Northern Illinois) struck out Nate Woods (Belmont) with the potential game tying run at third base to end the game.

Thunder Bay opened the scoring in the first inning on the first of two solo home runs in the game for Jon Kelton (Alabama). His second one came in the sixth to cut the Border Cats deficit to 4-2.

Madison built their lead with a pair of two-run innings in the third and fifth.  The Mallards scored runs in the third inning on a dropped fly ball by Kelton in left field and on and RBI single by Josh Groves (Wisconsin-Milwaukee). The runs in the fifth came across on a wild pitch and a bases loaded walk. Thunder Bay pushed across their third run of the game in the eighth inning on a Ryan Terry (Monmouth) single.

Down one run in the ninth, Thunder Bay nearly pulled out another thrilling home victory. Deain walked Kelton with one out. Two wild pitches later Kelton was 90 feet away from tying the game at four. Derek Wiley (Belmont) just missed ending the series when his long fly ball down the left field line hooked foul. Moments later Wiley went down on strikes for the second out of the inning. Nate Woods (Belmont) followed with a strikeout to give Andy Deain a save and the Mallards an important game two victory. Joe Yermal (Charlotte) worked five innings and allowed four hits and two earned runs to get the win. Danny Rosenbaum (Xavier) took the loss allowing four runs, two earned, over 4.2 innings.

The series will conclude tonight with a decisive game three beginning at 7:05 Eastern from Port Arthur Stadium in Thunder Bay. Alex Rivers (Santa Clara) will take the hill for the second time this postseason for the Mallards and oppose Michael Raymond (Belmont Abbey) of the Border Cats.

Click here to listen to the “Daily Recap”.