White Sox take Game 1 of wild-card series, topping Astros 6-3

HOUSTON — For the opening act, the White Sox and Houston Astros began their American League wild-card series with openers on the mound.

Both bullpens got a workout during Game 1, which the Sox won 6-3 on Tuesday in front of 34,011 at Daikin Park.

Hagen Smith gave the Sox three strong scoreless innings to start. And Grant Taylor did the heavy lifting at the end as the Sox grabbed a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three series.

“We came here to win the series and the first part of that is getting this first win, which is great,” manager Will Venable said. “These guys believe that they can win series here in the postseason, which showed up in the way that they took the field, strike early there with a couple runs, and I thought just the mindset that — not that you’re worried about it, but a bunch of young guys that haven’t been in this situation before, they didn’t back down at all.”

Taylor wrapped up the win with a performance Venable said was filled with “heroics.”

The right-hander allowed one unearned run over the final 2 1/3 innings. He surrendered two hits, walked one and struck out five in the 54-pitch outing.

“They came to me after my second up (following the eighth inning) and asked if I was good to go,” Taylor said. “I said, ‘Yeah, I’ll give you everything I got.”

Sam Antonacci and Colson Montgomery helped Taylor get in that position to close out the game. Antonacci went 1-for-3 with one walk, a hit by pitch, two RBIs and one run while Montgomery hit a solo home run.

“We were all so locked in at the plate,” Montgomery said. “We were sticking to our plan and our approaches, our game planning and stuff really well. I think that’s what showed for us today.”

Antonacci wasted no time getting involved. The left fielder started the game with a walk, advanced to second on a grounder to first and moved up to third on a throwing error by Christian Walker.

Antonacci scored on a sacrifice fly to right field by Munetaka Murakami, giving the Sox a 1-0 lead without the benefit of a hit.

Astros opener AJ Blubaugh walked three of the five batters he faced. He allowed the one run, which was unearned, in two-thirds of an inning.

The Sox loaded the bases with no outs in the second against Bryan King on singles by Braden Montgomery and Chase Meidroth, and Colson Montgomery getting hit by a pitch. Antonacci came through with a two-run single to left, stretching the Sox lead to 3-0.

“We came out swinging,” Antonacci said. “We knew it was going to be a little bit of a bullpen game from both sides, and our goal was just to see as many pitchers as possible and we did a really good job with that.”

The Sox still led 3-0 in the third inning when Astros designated hitter Yordan Alvarez came up with a runner on third and two outs. Alvarez grounded out to Miguel Vargas at third base to end the threat.

That was the last batter for Smith, who allowed two hits and struck out one over three scoreless innings as the opener.

“It was cool just to get the opportunity to go out there and do that,” Smith said. “Just kind of attacking it with everything. A lot of cutters and sliders and just kind of attacking with those a lot early, and heaters here and there.”

Colson Montgomery homered to lead off the fourth, making it 4-0. And a run scored on an infield hit by Meidroth in the fifth, increasing the lead to 5-0.

Jordan Hicks followed Smith with 1 1/3 scoreless innings for the Sox. But the Astros got within 5-2 on a two-run home run by pinch hitter Nelson Velázquez with two outs in the fifth against reliever Sean Newcomb.

The Sox got the run back in the seventh, making it 6-2 when Murakami scored on a wild pitch.

David Sandlin pitched 1 1/3 scoreless innings for the Sox before giving way to Taylor.

The Astros threatened in the eighth against Taylor, placing runners on the corners with one out. He struck out Isaac Paredes, but Jose Altuve reached when Murakami was ruled off the bag while receiving a throw from Vargas. A run scored on the error that was charged to Vargas, bringing the Astros within 6-3. Taylor rebounded to strike out Yainer Diaz looking.

“Kind of throwing everything to him at that point,” Taylor said. “(A) 3-2 (count), throwing him a few different options, curveball hadn’t seen it yet, and froze him for a strikeout.”

After a leadoff walk in the ninth, Taylor struck out two and got a groundout as the Sox made the all-hands-on-deck approach of five pitchers work.

“Everyone who threw, they came out there and they did their thing,” Colson Montgomery said. “It was gritty.”

And now they’re one win away from advancing. Sean Burke is the scheduled starter for Game 2, which is at 4 p.m. on Wednesday at Daikin Park.

“Our mindset is we’re taking it as though we’re 0-0, a lot can happen, and they have really good arms,” Antonacci said. “It’s 0-0 and we’re trying to win each pitch and hopefully that will help us win each inning and ultimately win the ballgame.”