Back-to-back homers lift Cubs over Padres 3-1 in Game 1 of wild-card series

The roar was deafening, as Cubs fans twirled blue “W” towels over their heads and catcher Carson Kelly rounded the bases.

In the fifth inning of the Cubs’ 3-1 win over the Padres in Game 1 of a best-of-three wild-card series, Cubs fans had a lot to cheer about.

Kelly’s go-ahead solo homer followed Seiya Suzuki’s game-tying blast, which accounted for the Cubs’ first run of the game.

It was just the fourth time in postseason history that the Cubs have hit back-to-back home runs, according to mlb.com. The most recent was 2016, when Miguel Montero and Dexter Fowler’s consecutive homers helped lift the Cubs over the Dodgers in Game 1 of the NLCS.

The Cubs had been trailing by one run since the second, when left-handed starter Matthew Boyd surrendered doubles to Jackson Merrill and Xander to lead off the inning.

“We’ve got to create pressure in as many innings as we can, and we’ll break through in one of those innings,” Cubs manager Craig Counsell said before the game. “But creating pressure, absolutely, is important.This is not a game where you try to get the starter up to a lot of pitches; that’s irrelevant. We’ve got to create base runners and pressure, and make pitchers make pressure pitches.”

For the first four innings of the game, the Padres offense did a better job of applying pressure than the Cubs.

The Cubs’ pitching and defense, however, didn’t buckle. They escaped the fourth inning with runners on first and third with an impressive catch by shortstop Dansby Swanson in the shallow outfield, and a fly ball to center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong in the right-field gap.

Then they broke through with the long ball against Padres starter Nick Pivetta. The tables turned, as the Cubs applied pressure on the Padres’ heralded bullpen and tacked on in the eighth with a sacrifice fly from Nico Hoerner.

The Cubs opened the best-of-three series at Wrigley Field on Tuesday.

 

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The team announced Boyd will start Tuesday against the Padres in the first game of the National League wild-card series.

 

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It’s not enough for the Cubs to grab a wild-card berth, then go over-and-out on their own turf against a foe with a lesser record.

 

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