D-BACKS RALLY, EVEN NLCS
The Arizona Diamondbacks came home after two losses in Philadelphia hoping to get back even in the National League Championship Series.
Diamondbacks 6, Phillies 5
Mission accomplished. Alek Thomas hit a tying, two-run homer in a threerun eighth inning, Gabriel Moreno followed with a goahead single and the Diamondbacks stunned the Phillies with a 6-5 victory on Friday night that tied the NLCS at two games apiece.
Arizona trailed 5-2 before Orion Kerkering's bases-loaded walk to Christian Walker with two outs in the seventh.
Lourdes Gurriel Jr. doubled leading off the eighth against Craig Kimbrel, who gave up Ketel Marte's game-ending single in Game 3. Thomas, pinch hitting for Emmanuel Rivera with one out, sent a fullcount fastball splashing into the right-center field swimming pool to tie the score 5-5 as a sellout crowd of 47,806 at Chase Field roared.
“I was looking for a fastball and hopefully get a good part of the bat on it, and it went over and into the pool so that was awesome,” Thomas said.
Marte singled with two outs, Corbin Carroll was hit by a pitch and José Alvarado relieved. Moreno laced a singled to left-center to drive in the go-ahead run for Arizona.
Kyle Schwarber, whose fourth-inning homer sparked Philadelphia's comeback from a 2-0 deficit, doubled with two outs in the ninth off Paul Sewald, Arizona's eighth pitcher. Sewald struck out Trea Turner for his fifth save of the postseason.
“We're not going to give up,” Thomas said. “How could we? We've got awesome fans here, and we're not done yet.”
Game 5 in the best-ofseven series is tonight, and the Diamondbacks have an extra surge after coming back to win Friday night, using all hands on deck to get it done.
“Momentum is a real thing,” Arizona manager Torey Lovello said. “You're right back in it. The narrative has definitely changed. And I think our team is always ready to go out and scrap, fight, battle, do whatever they have to do to win a baseball game.
Said Thomas: “It takes all of us. It takes a team to win a ballgame, and it showed up right there.”
A bonus for the Diamondbacks is they'll have ace Zac Gallen on the mound for today's Game 5, followed by Merrill Kelly for Game 6.
“Zac and Merrill on the back side of that, those guys are horses, and they're good for 18 to 21 outs just about every time they go out there,”
Houston earlier scored three times in the ninth to win 5-4 at Texas and take a 3-2 lead in the AL Championship Series. It was the first time in major league history two teams rallied to win postseason games on the same day after trailing by two runs or more in the eighth inning or later.
Arizona, in the postseason for the first time since 2017, lost the first two games of the series at Citizens Bank Park.
The Diamondbacks built a two-run lead against the defending NL champions on run-scoring singles by Rivera in the second and Moreno in the third.
Schwarber's homer was his fourth of this postseason and the 19th of his postseason career, passing Reggie Jackson for most among left-handed batters,
Brandon Marsh's twoout RBI double tied the score in the fifth, and the Phillies opened a 4-2 lead in the sixth after three straight walks by rookie lefty Andrew Saalfrank.
Alec Bohm followed with a chopper down the third-base line off Ryan Thompson. Rivera gloved the ball with a backhand grab that took him into foul territory and made an offbalance throw home from near the coach's box.
The ball short-hopped Gabriel Moreno and bounced off the catcher as two runs scored, one on the hit and one on the throwing error.
Trea Turner added a seventh-inning sacrifice fly.
Gurriel saved a potential extra-base hit in the second with a leaping catch at the left field wall after a drive by J.T. Realmuto.