Giants offense can’t keep up with Phils
PHILADELPHIA – It took four homers and an offensive outburst to give the Philadelphia Phillies their first winning streak in more than a month.
Maikel Franco hit a tiebreaking solo homer in the eighth, Freddy Galvis homered from both sides of the plate and Odubel Herrera also went deep as the Phillies beat the San Francisco Giants 9-7 Sunday to earn their first series victory in six weeks.
The Phillies have won two in a row for the first time since a sixgame winning streak April 20-27. They had lost 10 straight series before taking two of three from the Giants.
“It’s awesome. We fight and fight and came back to win the game,” Galvis said.
Brandon Crawford homered and drove in four runs and Eduardo Nunez also connected for San Francisco, which has lost seven of 10.
“We just didn’t execute pitches very well today and we got what you’re going to get when you don’t make pitches,” manager Bruce Bochy said.
The Phillies wasted leads of 41 and 6-3 before rallying against San Francisco’s bullpen. After Crawford’s two-run single in the seventh gave the Giants a 7-6 lead, Herrera’s RBI double off Josh Osich tied it at 7.
Franco led off the bottom of the eighth with an opposite-field drive off Derek Law (3-1).
“Tough month for me but I try to throw it away and think about game to game,” Franco said. “I’m seeing the ball good, try to get good swings.”
One out later, Galvis hit one out to right-center for his first career two-homer game. Galvis said he had never hit one from each side in the same game at any level. Jimmy Rollins was the last Phillies player to do it,
more than a glimpse of his greatness from up close after Kerr had been watching games from the locker room while speaking to his players beforehand and at halftime.
He ran circles around James during one masterfully skillful sequence, then drove left through the paint for a right-handed layup over the star’s outstretched arm during a signature moment in another rout.
Curry wore his emotions for everybody to see, willing the unblemished Warriors even when Cleveland went on a third-quarter run after that play.
Durant scored from every corner of the court. An off-balance KD flicked the ball up while falling backward and being fouled by Love and got a lucky bounce for a three-point play 7:04 before halftime just after Love had hit a 3 on the other end.
Now, Golden State is headed to Northeast Ohio needing just two more – yet don’t count on anybody considering this series close to done. The Warriors squandered a 3-1 lead to the Cavs a year ago to miss a repeat.
“Well, it’s been a great run but none of that matters unless we can finish the job with this series,” Kerr said. “Trust me, we know. It was 2-0 last year, we lost.”
Curry made all 14 of his free throws. He and Durant combined for 66 points and 18 assists in the opener, then dominated again while the supporting cast shined.
Draymond Green had 12 points, six rebounds and six assists playing all game in foul trouble and Shaun Livingston scored 10 off the bench.
This time, Curry committed eight turnovers as Cleveland committed to putting more pressure on the ball to keep Durant from driving and dunking untouched as he did so many times during the Warriors Game 1 win.
“They won two games,” Cavs coach Tyronn Lue said, “now we’ve got to go home and regroup.”