SAN DIEGO _ The Rays moved on Friday, beating the Yankees, 2-1, in a tense fifth and final game of the American League Division Series.
Now they move on to face the Astros, whose redemption tour from the cheating scandal has taken them back to the American League Championship Series. Game 1 is Sunday at 7:37 p.m. at Petco Park.
Mike Brosseau hit an eighth-inning homer off Aroldis Chapman on Friday night to provide the winning margin. And some sweet revenge for the Sept. 1 incident when Chapman threw a 100-mph pitch at Brosseau's head in the New York, sparking the latest incident between the increasingly rancorous rivals.
Brosseau delivered a line shot to left field on a 100-mph fastball to cap a 10-pitch at-bat.
The Rays, who finished the abbreviated season with an American League-best 40 wins, now advance to the ALCS for the second time in franchise history, and first since 2008. They had been eliminated the last four times they were in the Division Series, beaten by the Rangers in 2010 and 2011, the Red Sox in 2013, and the Astros last year, in what also was a Game 5 started by Gerrit Cole.
The tense game featured tremendously good and excessively high-velocity pitching by both sides.
Aaron Judge hit a homer for the Yankees in the fourth inning that was only the second hit Rays reliever Nick Anderson allowed to a right-handed hitter all season. Then Austin Meadows tied it in the fifth with a two-out homer that was the first hit Yankees starter Cole allowed on the night.
And that was it until the bottom of the eighth.
The Rays' decision to start Tyler Glasnow on two days rest after his 93-pitch Game 2 outing seemed a bit of a gamble, but it worked as he got them into the third. Then they doubled down on a surprising strategy, next turning next to their highest-leverage relievers, who typically pitch late in games.
Nick Anderson finished the third, then worked the fourth (allowing the homer to Judge) and fifth. Pete Fairbanks worked the sixth, escaping a two-out, two-on jam by striking out Luke Voit, and the seventh. Diego Castillo worked the eighth and the ninth.
