Tigers are one game away from taking the American League Divisional Series over the Yankees. Delmon Young's seventh inning home run powered the Tigers over the New York Yankees 5-4 in the third game of the American League Divisional Series Monday night at Comerica Park. Game 4 is Tuesday night in Detroit and Game 5, if necessary, in New York Thursday night. In the first two games at Yankee Stadium, New York prevailed Saturday 9-3 while the Tigers won Sunday 5-3

Detroit, MI

Jim Leyland says there's no reason to celebrate now....But he's hoping celebration time will come Tuesday night.

Delmon Young's seventh inning home run powered Leyland's Detroit Tigers over the New York Yankees 5-4 in the third game of the American League Divisional Series Monday night at Comerica Park.

Detroit leads the best of five series 2-1.

"We've got two and they got one," Leyland, Tiger manager, said. "That's all it means. Certainly, that team is capable of rattling off a bunch in a row, obviously two or more, without question. It's a great team. We put ourselves certainly in a decent position. But that's all we've done. This is a five-game series."

The game featured two of the top pitchers in the American League with Justin Verlander, 24-5, for Detroit during the regular season and CC Sabathia, 19-5, for New York. Both hurlers struggled in the early innings but settled down in the middle part of the game. Verlander struck out the side in the fifth and wound up with 11 strikeouts and four runs allowed in eight innings.

"Obviously, the life of my fastball was there pretty much the whole game," Verlander said. "Probably, I actually threw harder than I would have liked for most of the game. I might be a little sore tomorrow. But no ill effects. It felt good."

Jose Valverde recorded the save in the top of the ninth although the tying run was at second with two outs and Derek Jeter at the plate. Jeter is Major League Baseball's all-time postseason leader in hits with 189. But Valverde struck him out to end the game.

"Jose came in and what a job he did," Verlander said. "Coming back from throwing 35 pitches (Sunday) night can't be easy. I couldn't imagine doing that. The life of a closer...thankfully we had the best one in the league this year."

"I feel good about Jeter whenever he's up there in those situations because he's been there so many times," Yankee manager Joe Girardi said.

Verlander allowed a single by Jeter on the game's first pitch. Curtis Granderson, a former Tiger, tripled Jeter home and scored on Alex Rodriguez's bounceout.

Verlander then blanked the Yankees until the seventh inning.

"He settled down nicely," Girardi said. "His curveball was real effective, his change-up was real effective. Obviously when you throw 100 (MPH), that's going to be effective most of the times too."

Sabathia allowed five walks the first three innings but was also helped out by three double plays. In the third, he allowed an RBI single to Ramon Santiago. With the bases loaded and no outs, Sabathia got American League batting champion Miguel Cabrera to bounce into a double play, which scored the tying run.

Santiago doubled home Brandon Inge for Detroit's third run in the fifth. In the bottom of the sixth, Don Kelly led off with a bunt single and was doubled home by Jhonny Peralta for a 4-2 lead. Sabathia was pulled in the sixth inning after allowing four runs, seven hits and six walks.

Brett Gardner's two-out, two-run double off Verlander in the top of the seventh tied the game 4-4. But Young responded in the bottom of the seventh against Yankee reliever Rafael Soriano with his second homer of the series.

"I was just going up there just trying to get a good pitch to hit," Young said. "We needed desperately to get a run because playing a tie ballgame with the Yankees late in the game is never fun."

Game 4 is Tuesday night in Detroit and Game 5, if necessary, in New York Thursday night. In the first two games at Yankee Stadium, New York prevailed Saturday 9-3 while the Tigers won Sunday 5-3.

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