Cubs Win . . . Cubs Win . . . Cubs Win

Jayson Stark, Senior Writer, ESPN.com

CHICAGO -- Finally. So this is what it looked like. This is what it felt like. This is how the earth shook the night Chicago finally toasted a moment it had waited a century to drink in.

It was 6:54 p.m. Central Daylight Time. Hector Rondon held the baseball in his hand. Sixty feet away, Stephen Piscotty wagged his bat, waiting. Rondon took a deep breath, tugged on his cap, then turned toward the plate to deliver That Pitch.

Thousands of smart phones would record it. Families hugged in the stands, waiting for it. Rally towels spun in the breeze. To describe the deafening sound of Wrigley Field in this moment was just about impossible, because there has never been a sound quite like it. Not in this town. Not in this lifetime.

Rondon came to the stretch, paused and fired. Piscotty waved wildly at a slider in the dirt. Elation erupted in the Illinois night. Rondon leaped into the arms of his catcher Miguel Montero.

So this is what it looked like. This is what it felt like. This is how it sounded, the night the Chicago Cubs finally tasted the sweetness that only victory in October can bring.

It only took a century. Only took until the 100th season after they moved into storied Wrigley Field, in the same year the hamburger bun was invented. Finally, in the 7,907th game the Cubs have played at this fabled intersection of Clark and Addison, they won themselves a postseason series in their town, in their park, on their turf.

So maybe you're thinking -- and you have every right to think it -- that they "only" won a National League Division Series, with their emotional 6-4 triumph over the St. Louis Cardinals on Tuesday. It felt like something more, something bigger, something that transcended the normal meaning of games like this, moments like this.

"Nobody here will ever forget that they were here," said Cubs owner Tom Ricketts, standing on the infield grass, in the eye of this euphoric storm. "And that's amazing."

Ernie Banks never experienced this moment. Fergie Jenkins never got to feel this feeling. Granted, there was no such thing as a Division Series to rescue the Cubs of Gabby Hartnett, Hack Wilson or Wildfire Schulte, but they never got to witness what Kyle Schwarber and Anthony Rizzo and Javier Baez got to witness Tuesday night.

That, too, is amazing.

Schwarber is 22 years old. So is Baez. Rizzo is 26. They all hit home runs in this game that lit up the Chicago night like a lightning storm.

Baez pounded the opposite-field rocket that finished off a four-run second inning. Rizzo lofted a dramatic sixth-inning shot into the right-field bleachers, a half-inning after the Cardinals had risen up to tie this game at 4-4. Then Schwarber finished off the daily Youth Patrol home run barrage with a 438-foot Mars mission that cleared the brand new right-field scoreboard and disappeared into the North Side of Chicago.

"Wow," said veteran catcher David Ross. "That one might be in that lake out there."

Every one of those dudes was born more than 80 years after the Cubs last won a World Series. So pardon them if they laugh at all the tales of goats and curses and Bartman, and all the things that folks in their town were sure could never be done -- not in Chicago, not by the Cubs.

"Our guys don't buy into those old narratives," said Cubs president Theo (The Curse Buster) Epstein. "They're doing this for each other. The pressure and the history don't matter to them. They were in Instructional League last year. You think they're worried about history? They were just worried about getting their laundry done."

Well, the Cubs' dirty laundry is smelling cleaner by the day now, thanks to as dynamic a collection of young players as you'll ever find in one place, except possibly in the Futures Game. The Cubs hit 10 home runs in this series -- the most ever in a Division Series that went four games or fewer. Exactly one of them was hit by a player older than 26. Incredible.

Dodgers 3, Mets 1

Short rest has never been the issue for Clayton Kershaw in October. Winning when he couldn't afford to lose -- that was the problem.

Kershaw finally came through with the season on the line Tuesday night. He saved Los Angeles from another early playoff exit by pitching the Dodgers to a 3-1 victory over the New York Mets and forcing their NL Division Series to a deciding Game 5.

Working on only three days' rest, Kershaw shut down the Mets for seven innings, and Justin Turner delivered a key hit against his former team. The series shifts back to Los Angeles on Thursday, with the other Dodgers ace, Zack Greinke, scheduled to start against Jacob deGrom.

The winner will host the wild-card Chicago Cubs in the NL Championship Series opener Saturday.

Wednesday, October 14 Schedule (All Times Central)

Texas at Toronto, 3:07 p.m.

ALDS - GAME 5

Houston at Kansas City, 7:07 p.m.

ALDS - GAME 5

Thursday, October 15 Schedule (Time Central)

New York at Los Angeles, 7:07 p.m.