Cardinals claws are sharper, scratch their way back to beat the Tigers 5-4.

St. Louis withstood Detroit’s rejuvenated bats and found a way to win Thursday night taking a commanding 3-1 lead in the World Series.

Cardinals leadoff man, David Eckstein, finally got hot going 4-5 and drove in the winning run in the bottom half of the eighth. His line drive to left skipped off the glove of Craig Monroe and scored Aaron Miles from second base.

Detroit jumped to a 1-0 lead on a second inning homerun from Sean Casey off Cardinals starter Jeff Suppan. Casey came back in the third with an RBI single and was followed by Ivan Rodriguez’s RBI single to push the lead to 3-0.

In a sign of what was to come, the Cardinals got on the board in the bottom of the third when David Eckstein’s double scored Aaron Miles from second.

The Cardinals stuck with the two bagger and got a double from Yadier Molina in the bottom of the fourth to score Scott Rolen and cut the Tigers lead to 3-2.

The bottom of the seventh brought good fortune for the Cardinals as they took advantage of a throwing error from Tigers pitcher Fernando Rodney. The error scored David Eckstein and allowed Preston Wilson the opportunity to drive in So Taguchi and the Cardinals had a 4-3 lead.

The Tigers came right back in the eighth and tied the score when Brandon Inge’s double scored Ivan Rodriguez.

Not to be outdone, the Cardinals repeated their scoring recipe from the third as David Eckstein doubled to left and Aaron Miles scored the go-ahead run.

Adam Wainwright closed the door on the Tigers in the top of the ninth and the Cardinals moved to within one victory of their first World Series title since 1982.

Game five will be played Friday night in St. Louis.