By John Fay
Enquirer staff writer

The script was pretty much the same. The four-run lead was gone. The St. Louis Cardinals were on another late-inning roll.

"It was looking that way again," Adam Dunn said.

The one out the Reds had left in the eighth inning seemed the only thing standing between the Cardinals and a ninth-inning rally.

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It didn't turn out that way.

Dunn's three-run homer in the eighth was enough to render the Cards' rally in the ninth meaningless, and the Reds won 7-5 before a crowd of 36,079 at Great American Ball Park.

It was only the Reds' second win in nine games against the Cardinals this year.

And - after blowing a 4-0 lead just as they had in Friday's 7-5 loss - it was imperative for the Reds' psyche.

"We couldn't lose this game," Sean Casey said. "We had to find a way to win it."

That looked like a pretty tall task. Because, as has been the case all year vs. St. Louis, the Reds have been more adept at losing. The Cards scored three in the seventh and one in the eighth to tie it 4-all.

By the time Dunn came up in the eighth, the law of averages was in St. Louis' favor. Dunn faced left-hander Steve Kline. Lefties were hitting .175 off Kline. No lefty had homered off him. Dunn was 2-for-10 off Kline overall and hitting .212 with runners in scoring position.

"He and Ray King are the two best lefties in baseball," Dunn said. "With them, you get one pitch, you better hit it."

The pitch on this particular occasion was a hanging slider. Dunn crushed it. It landed well up in the right-field seats for his 26th of the year.

"I made a real bad pitch to the guy," Kline said. "With a big donkey like that, an all-or-nothing guy, I'm lucky he didn't hit it 17,000 rows deep."

Dunn's blast gave the Reds a 7-4 lead.

There was drama in the ninth. Reggie Sanders singled off closer Danny Graves and scored on Albert Pujols' single. That brought the tying run to the plate with two outs. But Jim Edmonds grounded out for Graves' 34th save of the year.

Graves blew the save and lost the game Friday with a three-run homer to Marlon Anderson.

"That's the good thing about being a closer," Graves said. "As bad as it was last night, as ugly as it was last night, you get a chance the next day."

A couple more losses like Friday's and "next days" would start running out for the Reds. Losing is painful, but the way the Reds have lost to the Cardinals has been excruciating.

"The Cardinals have had our number all year," Graves said. "It seems like everything goes right for them and wrong for us."

This one started as a good pitchers' duel between Cory Lidle and Jason Marquis.

The Reds took a 1-0 lead in the third on Casey's RBI single and then gave Lidle some working room in the fifth. Larkin led off with his fifth homer. Two outs later, D'Angelo Jimenez singled. That brought up Wily Mo Pena.

Pena hit one into the Reds' bullpen - a 410-foot shot - for his 12th of the year and fourth in four games.

Pena had been hit on the wrist by a pitch in the third, but Pena said anger didn't motivate him.

"No, I just went up there looking for a pitch to hit," Pena said. "He threw me a changeup. I hit it."

Far enough for a 4-0 lead.

Lidle had allowed two hits through six innings.

But the Cardinals strung together four hits in the seventh to close the lead to 4-3.

Gabe White struck out Tony Womack on 12 pitches and Todd Jones got Edgar Renteria to pop out on the first pitch to leave a runner on second.

"Those were two big outs," Reds manager Dave Miley said.

But the lead did not last. Pujols hit the first pitch Jones threw him in the eighth inning and the game was tied.

Ryan Freel started the Reds' rally by getting hit by a pitch with one out in the eighth.

The Cardinals brought in Kline to face Larkin. Freel stole second and Larkin worked a walk. That brought up Casey, who has been struggling (1-for-14 since the All-Star break). He flied out to center.

That put the onus on Dunn.

"Until Case gets back in the groove, someone has to pick it up," Miley said. "It was nice to see that from Adam."

Dunn's heroics left everyone in the Reds clubhouse happy.

"It's a huge win," Dunn said. "We've got a chance to even the series."

St. Louis	AB	R	H	BI	BB	SO	Avg.
Womack 2b	4	0	0	0	1	2	.308
Renteria ss	5	0	0	0	0	0	.288
Pujols 1b	5	1	2	2	0	1	.312
Edmonds cf	5	0	2	0	0	1	.283
Cedeno rf-lf	3	1	1	0	0	0	.280
MAnderson lf	4	0	0	0	0	0	.256
Kline p	0	0	0	0	0	0	---
Matheny c	4	1	2	1	0	1	.260
Luna 3b	3	1	1	0	1	0	.253
Marquis p	2	0	1	0	0	1	.282
Eldred p	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
Lankford ph	1	0	1	2	0	0	.267
King p	0	0	0	0	0	0	---
Tavarez p	0	0	0	0	0	0	---
RSanders rf	1	1	1	0	0	0	.257
Totals	37	5	11	5	2	6

Cincinnati	AB	R	H	BI	BB	SO	Avg.
Freel cf	3	2	1	0	0	1	.280
Larkin ss	4	2	2	1	1	1	.299
Casey 1b	5	0	1	1	0	0	.342
Dunn lf	5	1	1	3	0	2	.262
DJimenez 2b	4	1	2	0	1	0	.266
WPena rf	2	1	2	2	1	0	.290
Valentin c	4	0	2	0	0	0	.183
Larson 3b	1	0	0	0	1	0	.212
JCastro 3b	2	0	1	0	0	0	.272
Lidle p	3	0	1	0	0	1	.147
GWhite p	0	0	0	0	0	0	---
TJones p	0	0	0	0	0	0	---
JaCruz ph	1	0	0	0	0	0	.247
Graves p	0	0	0	0	0	0	---
Totals	34	7	13	7	4	5

St. Louis	000	000	311	-5	11	1
Cincinnati	001	030	03x	-7	13	0

E-Womack (9). LOB-St. Louis 8, Cincinnati 10. 2B-Luna (4), Lankford (14), DJimenez (16). HR-Dunn (26), off Kline; Pujols (24), off TJones; WPena (12), off Marquis; Larkin (5), off Marquis. RBIs-Pujols 2 (65), Matheny (26), Lankford 2 (18), Larkin (34), Casey (55), Dunn 3 (56), WPena 2 (33). SB-Freel 2 (17). S-Cedeno, Freel.

DP-St. Louis 1 (Womack and Pujols).

St. Louis	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	NP	ERA
Marquis	5	9	4	4	2	4	91	4.03
Eldred	1	2	0	0	0	1	15	5.12
King	2/3	0	0	0	0	0	6	1.36
Tavarez L, 2-3	2/3	1	1	1	1	0	15	3.16
Kline	2/3	1	2	2	1	0	15	2.36

Cincinnati	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	NP	ERA
Lidle	6 1/3	6	3	3	2	5	102	4.79
GWhite H, 4	1/3	0	0	0	0	1	12	3.75
TJones W, 8-2 BS, 5	1 1/3	3	1	1	0	0	15	3.88
Graves S, 34	1	2	1	1	0	0	10	3.12

Inherited runners-scored-Kline 1-1, GWhite 1-0, TJones 1-0.

HBP-by Tavarez (Freel), by Marquis (WPena).

T-3:04. A-36,079 (42,271).