like this. And that game helped propel us to

ST. LOUIS -- Aledmys Diaz learned a valuable lesson at the All-Star Game.The St. Louis rookie infielders walk-off single in the ninth inning gave the Cardinals a 6-5 come-from-behind victory over the San Diego Padres on Thursday night.St. Louis, which scored four runs in the eighth, recorded its first four-game series sweep at home since beating Colorado on Sept. 30-Oct. 3, 2010.San Diego has lost four of seven.Diaz ripped a full-count, one-out, bases loaded pitch into left field off reliever Carlos Villanueva (1-1).In this months All-Star Game, Diaz took a called third strike with the bases loaded to end the eighth inning of the ALs 4-2 victory.He decided that wasnt going to happen in a similar situation on Thursday.This time, I wanted to be aggressive, Diaz said. Go get it, if it looks good.Tommy Pham led off the bottom of the ninth with a double. Greg Garcia drew a walk and Jeremy Hazelbaker moved the runners over with a perfect bunt. Jedd Gyorko was walked intentionally to set the stage for Diazs heroics.St. Louis reliever Jonathan Broxton (2-2) picked up the win with a scoreless ninth.The Cardinals erased a 5-1 deficit in the eighth. Hazelbaker led off with a double and he scored on hit by Gyorko, his seventh RBI of the series against his former team. Kolten Wong doubled with one out and Stephen Piscotty hit a three-run homer to center field.This was definitely a special one, Piscotty said. Its a lot more fun when those things happen and you end up winning. This was a great way for our team to come back.Yangervis Solarte homered in the eighth inning to extend the Padres franchise-record home run streak to 19 consecutive games. The streak is the longest in the National League since the Milwaukee Brewers hit home runs in 20 consecutive games in July 2008.His 10th home run of the season pushed the lead to 5-1.To put it simply, its just hard work, Solarte said of the home run streak. I know we have some power on this team.Andrew Cashner, the subject of trade rumors the past few days, allowed one run and three hits for San Diego. He struck out eight and did not walk a batter. Cashner has allowed one run or less in three of his last four starts.Ive been working on a slider for the past couple weeks and Ive finally got a good feel, Cashner said.Alexei Ramirez had three hits and drove in two runs for the Padres, who have scored an NL-best 226 runs since June 1.St. Louis starter Adam Wainwright gave up two runs and seven hits over six innings. He struck out eight and did not walk a batter.Wainwright believes the comeback win can lead to better things.Were ready for a good streak here, he said. Were ready to run off a 12-spot or something.Ramirez gave his team a 1-0 lead with a run-scoring single in the fifth that brought in Ryan Schimpf, who doubled to start the inning. Travis Jankowski followed with an RBI double.St. Louis outfielder Matt Holliday left the game in the sixth inning after he was hit in the face by a pitch. The ball appeared to strike Hollidays helmet and then glance off his nose. X-rays were negative and he is listed as day-to-day.The Cardinals tied their largest comeback of the season by rallying from four runs down.We made some things happen, St. Louis manager Mike Matheny said. We got down and the guys kept playing the game. Watching them make plays, big hits, it was a great day for us.TRAINERS ROOMPadres: INF Brett Wallace was reinstated from paternity leave on Thursday. Wallace and his wife, Taylar, welcomed their first child, a boy named Beckett, on Monday. ... LHP Keith Hessler and INF/OF Alexi Amarista were optioned to Triple-A El Paso.Cardinals: INF/OF Brandon Moss took grounders before Thursdays game. Moss was placed on the 15-day DL on July 5 with a sprained ankle. He is expected back sometime within the next two weeks.UP NEXTPadres: RHP Luis Perdomo (3-4, 7.36) will face RHP Tanner Roark (9-5, 2.82) in the first of a three-game series in Washington on Friday.Cardinals: RHP Michael Wacha (5-7, 4.45) takes on RHP Brandon McCarthy (2-0, 1.69) in the first of a three-game set against the Dodgers in St. Louis on Friday. Wacha is 2-4 with a 4.85 ERA in 10 home starts this season. Where To Buy Cheap Kyrie Shoes . Bryzgalov stopped 25 shots on Saturday in the Oklahoma City Barons 4-1 victory over the Abbotsford Heat. The Oilers signed Bryzgalov to a one-year $2 million contract last Friday after shedding payroll by dealing defenceman Ladislav Smid to the Flames. Cheap Lebron Shoes . -- Cam Newton pranced into the end zone, placed his hands over his chest and did his familiar Superman pose. http://www.wholesalenikeshoesclearance.com/cheap-paul-george-shoes.html . Rob Manfred, baseballs chief operating officer, testified last week during the grievance filed by the players union to overturn Rodriguezs 211-game suspension. A person familiar with the hearing, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The Associated Press on Saturday that Manfred testified the sport wasnt concerned whether Bosch distributed performance-enhancing drugs to minors because MLBs interest was his relationship with players under investigation. Outlet Air Max 1 . The Montreal Canadiens announced on Friday that the veteran forward will return to the teams line-up on Saturday night when the Habs visit the Nashville Predators. Nike Air Max Plus Wholesale . The Barrie Colts defenceman, who impressed many with his play for Canada at the World Junior Hockey Championship, is the top-ranked skater in the February rankings. He has 19 goals and 24 assists for 43 points in 45 games with the Colts this season. SAN JOSE, Calif. -- No one left in the Womens College Cup has any championship experience.That wont stop either USC or West Virginia from experiencing a championship Sunday inside Avaya Stadium.It certainly didnt stop the Trojans and Mountaineers from earning the right to try.Fridays national semifinals were perhaps best summed up by the fact that the first coach to wonder aloud if a team felt final four jitters was the one who has won this tournament 21 times in the past. No such questions dogged No. 1 West Virginia after a 1-0 win over No. 2 North Carolina, the aforementioned Anson Dorrance dynasty, or No. 2 USC after its 1-0 win over No. 2 Georgetown.While USC won a national championship nine years ago, neither the head coaches nor the players involved on either side of Sundays final have any experience in such a setting. But in semifinals with such slim margins of error, both teams showed experience shapes in many ways.In a physical opening game in which chances had been decidedly scarce for both teams, an ill-timed foul by North Carolina gave West Virginia a free kick near its opponents end line in the 74th minute. Served toward the opposite post, the ball fell amongst a scrum. Several touches failed to produce a clearance for the Tar Heels, and the last attempt rolled to the feet of Michaela Abam just inside the 18-yard box. West Virginias leading scorer each of her first three seasons, Abam dragged the ball behind her with a deft touch, then let loose a left-footed shot that Dorrance accurately noted screamed into the top corner.Abam was raised on stories of Cameroonian soccer legend Roger Milla (who led a team with no World Cup experience to a draw against mighty Italy in 1982, presaging future glory) by parents from that nation. So upon scoring in the College Cup, she ran to the corner flag and broke out Millas signature celebratory dance. Neither the shot nor the dance hinted of any jitters.Goals have become precious in this postseason. All four quarterfinals were settled by the same 1-0 score as Fridays semifinals, the first time that happened in tournament history. Abams chance was West Virginias best, and she didnt let it go to waste.Excluding the first year of the NCAA tournament, teams were 7-19-1 in College Cup debuts entering this years semifinals. That included a 2-8-0 mark this century.Yet West Virginia isnt a typical newcomer. The Mountaineers arent here at the end of a Cinderella run. They are the last No. 1 seed standing, the only team in the country that hasnt lost multiple games (a fact its opponent ensured when it upset No. 1 seed South Carolina a week earlier).They havent been here before, but it helps them act as if they have when two captains have been on an Olympic medal podium. And when Kadeisha Buchanan and Ashley Lawrence have played with a nation watching, including 54,027 in the stands for a World Cup quarterfinal.I even think last year, when we [lost] in that Elite Eight game at Penn State, I think some of us got a little bit nervous and a little unsettled, West Virginia coach Nikki Izzo-Brown said. I think experience, obviously [Buchanan] and Ashley bring so much at the highest stages, so we can feed off of them as our captains and our leaders. [Midfielder] Carly Black has been [around] for five years, she recognizes that. ... The leadership is a piece that potentially we didnt have last year or the years before.North Carolina had chances after Abams goal. But those chances came only when it threw caution to the wind and pushed forward to try and equalize. It had chances only when those chances came with a season riding on their success. Perhaps that added weight played its part when freshmen Bridgette Andrzejewski and Madison Schultz leaned a little too far back on chances and blasted balls over the crossbar in the closing minutes.When West Virginia lost starting right back Bianca St. Georges to an ankle injury early in the second half, the talented sophomore carried off without putting anyy weight on either leg, Lawrence relocated from the midfield to play on the back line and substitute Vanessa Flores entered the midfield.ddddddddddddThe game was still scoreless at the time, and it wasnt as if the Mountaineers were knocking on the door with great opportunities. But rather than fret about moving a world-class player farther from the opponents goal, West Virginia used the plan that worked in the regular season.Obviously its a very difficult move for us to lose [Lawrence] in midfield and that constant threat that she provides for us, Izzo-Brown said. But it was something we needed to do to make sure that we could stay in this game and be effective. We have other players we have called on -- I thought Vanessa Flores did an incredible job, as Ashley Woolpert did and Carla [Portillo]. Its difficult to make a call like that, but Ashleys done that for us in numerous games.In that moment, like the game as a whole, West Virginia trusted its own experience.Scoring chances were marginally more plentiful in the second semifinal between USC and Georgetown, but the final product was no easier to locate. The game was scoreless at halftime, a fortunate development for a USC team that was arguably outplayed during those first 45 minutes. Georgetown proved its own College Cup debut no fluke, but the Hoyas couldnt score.In addition to some tangible tactical tweaks to break up Georgetowns spatial dominance, USC players heard a halftime message that coach Keidane McAlpine summed up in one word: Breathe.Several of the players who were a part of USCs win Friday were around when the team missed the NCAA tournament entirely in 2013. That completed the programs fall from grace after its 2007 title and precipitated the coaching change that brought McAlpine from Washington State.The first thing with the program that we had to do was learn how to compete again and get back to the national tournament, McAlpine said. That was year one.The past two years were about playing the kind of competition, even beyond the Pac-12, that teams must master if they hope to compete for a championship. That culminated a month ago in a setting that couldnt match the stakes of the College Cup but still dwarfed the atmosphere in San Jose on Friday in front of a crowd that numbered barely 4,000 on a workday afternoon and with little time to publicize the event following its relocation from Cary, North Carolina, because of that states anti-LGBTQ legislation.That was when USC lost 1-0 to UCLA and perhaps cost itself a No. 1 seed.There were 8,500 people there, McAlpine said. It was a rivalry game. There were a lot of things going on, a lot of distractions that could take us away from the job at hand. Losing that game, I think, helped prepare us to understand what the intensity needs to be, what the environment feels like of a game like this. And that game helped propel us today.So it was that in the 60th minute, as USC began to take control of the games flow, when Morgan Andrews gathered a pass on the edge of the 18-yard box and chipped a picture perfect delivery to Katie Johnson. Her back to goal, Johnson spun over her right shoulder, separated from the defender behind her and beat the keeper with a low shot toward the post. If it ceded artistic merit to Abams goal, it wasnt by all that much.Credit to Andrews, the senior who transferred from Notre Dame, for finding Johnson, a fifth-year senior on the field only because of a redshirt season a year ago due to injury.Experience comes in many forms.Pleased with how his team played in its own debut, the unmistakable pain of the result aside, Georgetown coach Dave Nolan said he told his players after the game to look around them.Theres worse places to finish, Nolan said.Indeed, there is no experience quite like it for a college soccer player. But that wasnt a prerequisite for success Friday. ' ' '