Alec Bohm hit a two-out, solo homer off Braves reliever Didier Fuentes in the 10th inning to give the Phillies a 4-3 win Wednesday at Truist Park.
The result sends the National League Wild Card series to a winner-take-all third game at a time to be announced Thursday.
Bohm’s homer came on the third pitch of his at-bat. He lifted a 99-mph fastball to deep right field and it hung in the air long enough to go over the wall. It completed a Phillies comeback after the visitors were down to their final six outs.
Down 3-1 to begin the eighth, Phillies designated hitter Kyle Schwarber hit a Dylan Lee slider 447 feet out to right to start the eighth. Then Bryce Harper went back-to-back, and his homer tied the game at 3-all. Lee had only allowed three home runs in 67 innings during the regular season.
The Braves got a two-out single from Drake Baldwin in the ninth against Phillies right-handed pitcher Andrew Painter, a starter, but nothing else. Mauricio Dubón got aboard via a one-out single in the 10th and Michael Harris II blooped a two-out single to left but pinch-hitter Dominic Smith struck out looking on a fastball on the inside black.
The Phillies, as they did in Game 1, scored first in Game 2 with Harper’s RBI single to left in the top of the first off Braves’ starter Tyler Mahle. That scored leadoff man Trea Turner, who had doubled to right-center and moved to third on a grounder to second.
But Harper also made a critical baserunning mistake when he broke for home on a one-out comebacker to Mahle. Harper was caught in no-man’s land between third and home and eventually thrown out after a brief rundown.
The Braves countered against Sánchez in the second thanks, in part, to Ronald Acuña Jr., drawing a leadoff walk. Acuña stole second with Baldwin at the plate and stole third with two outs and Olson at the dish. Olson, meanwhile, worked a full count, and on the eighth pitch of his at-bat, fisted an RBI single to right to tie the game.
Both starters settled in from there.
Mahle was sensational again for the Braves, throwing 95 pitches through seven innings and allowing just the one first-inning run. He struck out six and walked only one hitter in his postseason debut.
Sánchez escaped a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the sixth. He got Harris to swing at a first-pitch sinker and grounded into a 3-2-3 double play. Harris is now 2-for-18 with 11 strikeouts against the Phillies’ ace in his career.
The left-handed Sánchez walked Sean Murphy to start the seventh, then got no help from his defense when Ha-Seong Kim dropped a sacrifice bunt to the right of the mound and first baseman Alec Bohm threw to second to try to cut down Murphy, who was easily safe.
The Phillies left Sánchez in and he struck out Acuña. And it looked like he got Baldwin to fly to right, but Baldwin drove a 1-2 sinker to right field that Harper initially came in on, then tried to retreat in time to make a leaping catch. The ball glanced off his glove, allowing Murphy to score and Kim to reach third.
Olson hit a sacrifice fly to deep left-center, putting the Braves ahead by two.
But they weren’t out of the woods yet.