National League Game Summary - Los Angeles at San Francisco
San Francisco, CA (SportsNetwork.com) - Clayton Kershaw struck out nine over eight strong innings to pick up his major league-leading 19th win of the season, as the Los Angeles Dodgers held off the San Francisco Giants, 4-2, in the rubber match of a three-game series.
Kershaw (19-3) won his fifth straight start after giving up two runs on seven hits for the Dodgers, who lead San Francisco by three games for first place in the NL West.
"It showed a lot about our team," said Kershaw. "It's obviously a huge series for us and the way we did it to win the series was pretty cool."
Matt Kemp hit a two-run homer for Los Angeles, which pounded out 24 hits in a 17-0 victory on Saturday after losing 9-0 on Friday.
Matt Duffy and Buster Posey each drove in a run for the Giants, who have lost two in a row since a four-game winning streak. Yusmeiro Petit (5-4) allowed four runs -- three earned -- on eight hits while striking out eight over seven innings.
"We don't like losing," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said. "We made a couple of mistakes and when you are playing against a guy like Kershaw it can come back to haunt you."
The Dodgers jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the second. Hanley Ramirez reached on an infield single and raced to third on Juan Uribe's single to right. Hunter Pence's throw got past third baseman Pablo Sandoval. Petit backed up the play, but threw wildly to the plate as Ramirez scored. A.J. Ellis followed with a sacrifice fly.
The Giants got on the board in the third. Petit walked, advanced to second on Joe Panik's single and scored on Posey's base hit to left-center field.
Los Angeles tacked on two more runs in the sixth. Adrian Gonzalez doubled and crossed the plate on Kemp's blast to left-center field.
San Francisco got one run back in the seventh. With men on first and second and two outs, Duffy hit an RBI single to shallow center field. Angel Pagan grounded out to keep it 4-2.
Kenley Jansen tossed a perfect ninth for his 42nd save of the season.