Aroldis Chapman Leads Cubs To 3-2 Win Over Indians; Cleveland Leads World Series 3-2

Scores of Chicago Cubs fans have held their breath for the past two days. If they couldn’t witness their team win its first championship since 1908, could the franchise at least win one World Series game at Wrigley Field?

Aroldis Chapman Leads Cubs To 3-2 Win Over Indians; Cleveland Leads World Series 3-2

The team delivered, and Aroldis Chapman’s trick — a career-best eight-out save–on Sunday night carried the Cubs to a 3-2 home victory over the Indians to cut Cleveland’s World Series lead to 3-2 at the end of Halloween weekend.

“I feel like we play our best with our backs up against the wall,” Kris Bryant said after the Cubs’ first win in a World Series game at Wrigley Field since 1945. “We went out there today, took care of business. Hopefully we can get out there and win Game 6, because you never know what can happen in a Game 7.”

Bryant scored a big home run in the three-run fourth inning.

Wrigleyville has been buzzing as the Cubs hosted their first World Series in 71 years. By the end of the night, Cubs fans celebrated the win that kept them alive in the series by singing “Go Cubs Go.”

Pre-game, the team got pumped up thanks to Anthony Rizzo, who ran around the clubhouse playing the theme from the movie “Rocky” and then used it as his walk-up music for his first at-bat.

“I wanted to get the crowd pumped and let them know we plan on going the distance,” Rizzo said. “Hopefully, we’re the last ones standing.”

Indians starter Trevor Bauer, who lost Game 2 at Progressive Field, struck out seven, including five of the first 10 batters he faced. The Cubs have had no problems catching balls, including a wall-climbing snag by Jason Heyward to stop Bauer’s foul popup down the right-field line.

With the exception of a 3-0 pitch that Ben Zobrist hit for a single two batters after Bryant’s homer, “I located every single pitch that they hit exactly where I wanted them,” Bauer said. “Sometimes, it doesn’t work out for you. I got three of them to chase balls that were way out of the zone. Usually, those go in your favor. Clearly, not tonight.”

Jose Ramirez gave the Tribe a 1-0 lead in the second. Bryant tied the game with a leadoff blast in the fourth, the seventh homer allowed by Cleveland in 13 postseason games. The Cubs then added four hits in five at-bats, including an RBI infield single by Addison Russell that scored Rizzo and started a 2-1 lead. David Ross, who played his final game at Wrigley Field before retiring after the season, added a sacrifice fly.

Francisco Lindor’s RBI single in the sixth pulled the Indians within 3-2, and both teams’ managers, Joe Maddon and Terry Francona, turned to their closers early. Maddon called on Chapman with one out and one on in the seventh, and the lefty escaped that jam, worked around a runner reaching third in the eighth and closed the win with a perfect ninth. Maddon said he had alerted Chapman that he might call on him early.

Francona brought in Cody Allen in the bottom of the seventh, after Bryan Shaw retired the first batter. Allen worked a scoreless 1 2/3 innings to stop the Cubs from scoring, but Chapman stopped the Tribe’s offense for the rest of the night.

“We’re trying to do anything to get on base and get something going,” Indians first baseman Mike Napoli said. “He was going to be in there to the end — that’s what it looked like. We had an opportunity.”

The loss was a rarity for Francona, who is now 11-2 in World Series games, but the Indians will continue the pursuit of their first championship since 1948 on Tuesday in Cleveland.

“Sometimes you’ve got to respect what the other team can do, too,” Francona said. “Sometimes they beat you. I didn’t think we beat ourselves. I thought they beat us.”

Right-hander Josh Tomlin will start for the Indians on Tuesday, while Cubs righty Jake Arrieta will make his fourth postseason start and second at Progressive Field.

CHICAGO, IL – OCTOBER 30: Aroldis Chapman #54 of the Chicago Cubs pitches in the seventh inning against the Cleveland Indians in Game Five of the 2016 World Series at Wrigley Field on October 30, 2016 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)

Article by Pablo Mena