(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.