Hunter Greene carried a no-hit bid through 6 2/3 innings and allowed just one hit en route to his second career complete game, fueling the host Cincinnati Reds to a 1-0 victory over the Chicago Cubs on Thursday night.
Will Benson ripped an RBI double in the fourth inning to provide Greene (7-4) with all the offense he would need on Thursday and keep alive the flickering postseason aspirations of the Reds (77-76).
Cincinnati, which has won two in a row and three of its last four games, remained two games behind the New York Mets (79-74) for the final wild-card spot in the National League. The Mets posted a 6-1 win over the San Diego Padres earlier on Thursday.
Fresh off clinching their postseason berth on Wednesday, the Cubs (88-65) were unable to capitalize on Colin Rea’s 11-strikeout performance and saw their four-game winning streak come to a halt.
Greene retired the side in order through the first four innings before Moises Ballesteros reached on an error by shortstop Elly De La Cruz to lead off the fifth. Greene responded by retiring the next three batters to close out the inning and breezed into the seventh before Seiya Suzuki belted a double down the left-field line with two outs to end the no-hit bid.
Undaunted, Greene induced Carson Kelly to ground out to end the seventh and retired the side in order in both the eighth and ninth innings. His previous complete game was a rain-shortened seven-inning contest, 7-0 over the visiting Arizona Diamondbacks on June 6, 2022.
Greene finished with nine strikeouts on Thursday to highlight his 109-pitch masterpiece. That is a distinctly better performance than the one he put forth on Saturday after he permitted five runs on four hits — including two homers — in 2 1/3 innings of an 11-5 setback to the host Athletics.
Austin Hays. who recorded two of the four hits by Reds, doubled to lead off the fourth inning against Rea (10-7). Hays came around to score after Benson hit a one-out double to right-center field.
Rea took the hard-luck loss after permitting one run on four hits and no walks in seven innings.
