Gut-check time for Sox, Yanks

NEW YORK (AP) -- It comes down to this: Game 7.
Again.
It seemed inevitable for so long, yet so implausible Sunday night:
Yankees vs. Red Sox, winner take all.
With blood seeping through his sock, a grimace on his face and pride filling his heart, Curt Schilling shut down the Yankees and -- just as he wanted -- shut up 55,000-plus New Yorkers.
Less than 48 hours after the Yankees were three outs from a sweep, Schilling's 4-2 victory Tuesday night tied the AL championship series 3-3 and put Boston within one victory of becoming the first major league team to overcome a 3-0 postseason deficit.
"We just did something that has never been done yet," Schilling said. "It ain't over yet. It ain't over by any stretch against this team and this organization."
Derek Lowe will start for Boston against TBA (to be announced).
That's right, going into their most important game of the season, Yankees manager Joe Torre couldn't say who will take the mound. While Kevin Brown is the mostly likely guess, Javier Vazquez is in the mix, and Orlando Hernandez and Mike Mussina could be coming in out of the bullpen.
Yanks search for answers
"We've got to play better for one game, that's the bottom line," Yankees captain Derek Jeter said. "Their team has responded. We're going to find out about our team tomorrow night."
With the benefit of two reversed calls by umpires, the Red Sox are just one win from getting back to the World Series for the first time since 1986 and earning another chance to reverse The Curse.
Pitching on a dislocated ankle tendon held down by three sutures put in the day before, Schilling gave up one run and four hits in seven innings.
"When I saw blood dripping though the sock and he's giving us seven innings in Yankee Stadium, that was storybook," Boston first baseman Kevin Millar said.
The Yankees, who rallied from a 5-2, eighth-inning deficit in Game 7 last year and won 6-5 on Aaron Boone's homer off Tim Wakefield in the 11th, were ahead 4-3 in the ninth inning of Game 4 Sunday night at Fenway Park only to lose in the 12th.
They led Game 5 in the eighth Monday, then lost that one, too, another marathon that stretched on for 14 innings and almost 6 hours.
Never done before
Of the 25 previous major league teams that fell behind 3-0 in a best-of-seven series, none had forced a Game 7.
Schilling, who accepted a trade to the Red Sox last fall for the express purpose of beating the Yankees, took a three-hit shutout into the seventh before allowing Bernie Williams' solo homer.
Last week, he seemed done for the season. The tendon was sutured Monday, but he couldn't wear a special high-top shoe because it put too much pressure on the area. As soon as he left the game Tuesday night, the stitches were removed.
"This training staff was just phenomenal -- the things they did for me over the last four, five, six days," he said. "To avoid having it popping in and out, they sutured the skin down to something in between the two tendons to keep the tendon out. It worked."
The finale will be the 52nd meeting of the teams since the start of the 2003 season.
"All those games and it's down to one," Boston reliever Mike Timlin said. "We could probably have done this in spring training and saved the trouble."
While the ghosts of Yankees past usually turn games for New York in the Bronx, Boston got the breaks on a cold, misty night.
Bellhorn raps 3-run homer
After Orlando Cabrera's RBI single off Jon Lieber in the fourth, Mark Bellhorn hit a ball over the left-field wall that was at first ruled a ground-rule double by left-field umpire Jim Joyce before it was correctly changed to a three-run homer that made it 4-0. The ball hit a fan in the chest, and the other five umpires knew it.
"I kind of surprised myself that it went out," said Bellhorn, who had been in a 4-for-32 postseason slump.
Then in the eighth, after Miguel Cairo's double and Jeter's RBI single off Bronson Arroyo pulled the Yankees to 4-2, Alex Rodriguez hit a ball between the mound and first. Arroyo picked it up and ran toward first, where just before the base the striding A-Rod slapped the ball away.
Jeter came all the way around to score as the ball bounced down the right-field line. After Boston manager Terry Francona came out to argue, the umpires huddled, discussed the play, then called Rodriguez out for interference and sent Jeter back to first.
BOSTONNEW YORK
abrhbiabrhbi
Damon cf5010Jeter ss4011
Mueller 3b4000ARdrgz 3b4010
MRmrz lf4010Shffield rf4010
DOrtiz dh4000Matsui lf3000
Nixon rf3000BWllms cf4111
Kapler rf1010Posada c4000
Millar 1b4120Sierra dh3000
Mntkw 1b0000TClark 1b4000
Varitek c4131Cairo 2b3120
OCbera ss4120
Bllhorn 2b3113
Reese 2b0000
Totals364114Totals33262
Boston000400000--4
New York000000110--2
DP--New York 2. LOB--Boston 7, New York 6. 2B--Millar (3), Cairo 2 (3). HR--Bellhorn (1), BWilliams (2). SB--OCabrera (1).
IPHRERBBSO
Boston
Schilling W,1-1741104
Arroyo121101
Foulke S,1100022
New York
Lieber L,1-17 1-394402
Heredia1-300000
Quantrill2-320000
Sturtze2-300010
HBP--by Lieber (Mueller). WP--Lieber.
Umpires--Home, Joe West; First, Randy Marsh; Second, Jeff Nelson; Third, John Hirschbeck; Left, Jim Joyce; Right, Jeff Kellogg. T--3:50. A--56,128.