Jason Heyward hit a two-run, tie-breaking double in the seventh inning keyed a five-run rally that helped the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Washington Nationals 8-5 on Monday night. St. Louis won for the eighth time in nine games and moved five games ahead of the idle Pittsburgh Pirates in the NL Central.
Washington, which had won six of its previous eight, fell 6 1/2 games behind the New York Mets in the NL East. New York beat Philadelphia 3-1 on Monday.
The Cardinals sent 10 batters to the plate in the seventh and erased a 5-3 deficit with five two-out runs. They followed with one big hit after another as six successive hitters reached base.
Kolten Wong followed Heyward’s hit with a run-scoring single to push the lead to 8-5.
Stephen Piscotty and Jhonny Peralta had RBI hits off Casey Janssen (1-3) to tie the game. Felipe Rivero gave up the double to Heyward.
Mark Reynolds started the outburst with a single. Brandon Moss reached on a broken-bat infield hit. Following a double play, Matt Carpenter drew a walk to start the line moving.
Kevin Siegrist (6-1) picked up the win despite allowing three runs in the seventh.
St. Louis closer Trevor Rosenthal recorded his 42nd save in 44 opportunities. He had missed the previous three games due to the birth of his daughter.
The Cardinals scored three runs in the third on successive run-scoring hits by Yadier Molina, Kolten Wong and Mark Reynolds to go up 3-1.
Information from Espn.com and The Associated Press contributed to this report.