Seiya Suzuki and Miguel Amaya hit solo homers, helping Kyle Hendricks and the Chicago Cubs beat the Kansas City Royals 4-3 on Sunday.
Chicago, which has a one-game lead fir the NL's final wild card, won two in a row after losing the series opener.
Jordan Lyles (3-14) became the major leagues' first 14-game loser as Kansas City fell for the fourth time in five games and dropped to 40-86, better only than Oakland among the 30 major league teams.
Hendricks (5-6) won for the first time since July 25, allowing one run and five hits in 6 1/3 innings. He retired 10 in a row before his lone walk, to Matt Beaty in the fifth inning.
Mark Leiter Jr. got two outs in the seventh, Julian Merryweather pitched a perfect eighth and Adbert Alzolay got his 18th save in 19 chances after allowing pinch-hitter Maikel Garcia's run-scoring single and Beaty's RBI groundout. With a runner on second, Dairon Blanco hit a game-ending groundout.
The game lasted 2 hours, 2 minutes, then the fastest nine-inning game at Wrigley Field since a 2-1 win over Philadelphia on May 8, 2005, took exactly 2:00.
Cubs RHP Javier Assad (2-2) is scheduled to start Monday at Detroit, which goes with RHP ALex Faedo (2-4, 5.16). Assad is 1-0 with a 2.70 ERA since rejoining the rotation on Aug. 5.