The St. Louis Cardinals saw their four-game winning streak end on Wednesday night with a loss against the Milwaukee Brewers in a close game. Domingo Santana had hit a two-run home run with two outs in the ninth inning off of closer Trevor Rosenthal, giving the Brewers a 6-4 lead and eventually, the victory.
On Thursday afternoon, veteran Jaime Garcia took the mound to try and help get the Cardinals back on track.
For Milwaukee, Wily Peralta was sent to the mound, looking to stifle an offense that has been on an absolute tear.
After a scoreless first by both teams, the Cardinals were able to score first, this time in the bottom of the second inning. Randal Grichuk started things off with hitting a single, extending his hitting streak to three games. He also tied his career-best with an extra base hit and an RBI in three consecutive games (9/19-21/2014)
Later in the inning, Yadier Molina doubles, in the process extending his own hitting streak to five games. A sacrifice fly by Kolten Wong gave the Cardinals a 1-0 lead.
But they weren’t done yet, as Matt Carpenter hit a two-run double to make it 3-0 Cardinals in the second inning.
Two innings later, Grichuk hit his first home run of the season, a two-run shot that also scored Brandon Moss.
The real story of the game, however, was the dominating performance of Garcia. Through the first five innings, Garcia allowed only one baserunner, and it was after a strikeout pitch got away from Molina. He had a no-hit bid heading into the sixth inning, until Santana broke it up with a two-out single.
That didn’t stop the hot streak Garcia was on.
He would break his career high in strikeouts by throwing 13 strikeouts, allowing only one hit, and would end up throwing the first complete game by a Cardinals pitcher since 2014.
With the 7-0 victory, the Cardinals improve to 5-4 on the season, as they prepare for a three game series against the Cincinnati Reds.
