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When the Cardinals’ offense needed what it’s been lacking in the past several weeks, it got a helping hand from a familiar face.

Jordan Montgomery, the one-time Cardinals’ starter and new Arizona headliner, made his only real mistake of the afternoon when his former team had the go-ahead run at third base. Montgomery skipped a wild pitch that allowed the Cardinals to break a tie without any of the things the lineup has mostly been missing during this home stand — a hit and an RBI.

Willson Contreras, playing through a deep bone bruise in his left hand, put in motion the decisive inning on the way to a 5-1 victory Wednesday at Busch Stadium. Contreras’ double moved leadoff hitter Brendan Donovan to third, put two runners in scoring position, and brought the Diamondbacks’ infield in to protect a one-run lead.

Nolan Arenado lined a single over the infielders’ reach.

That first-pitch, RBI base hit tied the game, and got Contreras within striding distance of home. Montgomery gave him the invitation with the wild pitch and the one-run lead, their first lead since the walk-off win Monday.

The Cardinals’ resolute bullpen held on from there.

The offense added on late.

The game ended with a double play, fireworks, and an extended review when Arizona challenged the call at both bases. That only wasted the fireworks and delayed the D-Backs’ packing. Replay did not overturn either call.

A day after a gruesome game, the Cardinals found their way back into a familiar tense game, played in front of an chanting and yelling and enthusiastic crowd of schoolkids. Before the eighth-inning add-ons, the stingy pitching from starter Kyle Gibson and the opportunistic offense allowed the Cardinals to make the most out of so few runs in the series. They were outscored in the series, lost one game by 13 runs, and yet won the series against the defending National League champs. The Cardinals claimed both games they scored at least five runs.

In his third start for the team he signed with as a free agent at the start of the season, Montgomery shaved his ERA beneath 1.00 by throwing five shutout innings against his former teammates. The Cardinals had only one runner get as far as second base vs. Montgomery until Contreras’ double in the sixth. Montgomery (1-1) limited the Cardinals to three runs on six hits and he struck out four.

Gibson (2-2) steered through a rocky first inning to provide the Cardinals six solid innings and limit Arizona to one run, which was scored on a sacrifice fly.

Ryan Helsley authored a scoreless ninth to secure the win.

Go, go gadget Cardinals

An insurance run against Montgomery developed in the seventh inning with a tough call and a fortunate call made by opposite ends of the ballpark.

Masyn Winn, the Cardinals’ shortstop off to a brisk start this season, stung a groundball up the middle. Arizona shortstop Blaze Alexander went to his left and made a lunging stop on the grounder. He had to retrieve the carom and get to his feet for a throw that had the right timing to get Winn — but was low, skipped, and was not caught. The throw was ruled an error by the official scorer in the press box, putting Winn on first.

He was not there long.

Against the lefty Montgomery, Winn got an aggressive, incredible jump on a call from the dugout. At the same time, Montgomery left a pitch up in the zone and away from left-handed batter Nolan Gorman. He poked it to left field, and because Winn was already at second base by then the speedy shortstop just kept going. He rounded third to score from first on a single.

In the eighth, the Cardinals spun two walks and a single into seeding the bases for Lars Nootbaar’s two-run double.

Gibson hopscotches around trouble

For the first half of the game, the Diamondbacks produced as many baserunners from their first three hitters of the game than the Cardinals had total.

Back-to-back singles welcomed Gibson to the game, and then, as if to increase the degree off difficulty, the veteran right-hander plunked Joc Pederson with a pitch to load the bases, all before he had any outs. With the Diamondbacks poised to build upon their 13-run romp Tuesday night with a big-inning beginning Wednesday, Gibson did not lose his hold on the inning. A sacrifice fly produced the first inning’s lone run and gave Gibson the out he needed to pry free of the inning. A double play ball did the rest.

Inviting and then sidestepping traps defined Gibson’s quality start.

A wild pitch in the second inning gave the Diamondbacks a quick runner in scoring position, and there he stayed as Gibson retired the bottom third of the lineup. In the fourth, a walk and another wild pitch put two runners in scoring position. Gibson struck out Kevin Newman to leave another two Diamondbacks marooned in scoring position. The first two batters of the fifth inning also reached base to bring up the middle of Arizona’s order. Gibson turned them back in order.

The batter he hit to load the bases in the first? Pederson?

Three pitches later Pederson stood starting at a fastball for a called strike 3.

That unplugged the inning and kept Gibson chugging through six.

Pages gets save – at catcher

The Cardinals continue to carry three catchers on the roster to free up Ivan Herrera and Contreras to both be in the lineup, as they were Wednesday. But another way the Cardinals could use the roster revealed itself late in the game as they tried to hold what was a one-run lead. Pages replaced Herrera for the final two innings to give the Cardinals a quality framer and deterrent behind the plate. Arizona ran its way to the NL pennant this past year, and Herrera has had difficulty this season throwing runners out. Opponents are 12-for-12 against Herrera in attempted thefts. Pages offered a different look for Arizona to consider.