DENVER - The Phillies had the best road record (48-33) in the National League this season.

The Colorado Rockies were 44-17 at home after Jim Tracy took over as manager on May 29.

So something had to give when the two teams met in Game 3 of the NL division series last night at arctic Coors Field.

The Phillies won, 6-5, to take a two games-to-one lead in the best-of-five series. Guess who had the save? Yep, Brad Lidge.

Here's a look at some of the key points in the game:

Big break

Jimmy Rollins scored the eventual winning run on a sacrifice fly by Ryan Howard in the ninth. Rollins went to third on Chase Utley's infield hit. Ah, but television replays showed Utley's hit should have been a foul ball because it hit his leg in the batter's box.

Rusty lefty

J.A. Happ pitched just two innings in the previous 11 days, then had to make his first postseason start in January.

At least it felt like January with a game time temperature of 35 degrees. (It fell to 30.5 degrees in the seventh inning.)

The sub-par Happ needed 76 pitches to get through three innings. He allowed seven baserunners and three runs. He faced 16 batters and threw a first-pitch strike to just four of them. Joe Blanton followed Happ and allowed a run in 2 2/3 innings.

Fourth-inning uprising

The Phillies had some good at-bats and a poor one in rallying for three runs against Colorado starter Jason Hammel in the fourth inning.

Good: Shane Victorino was patient in taking a leadoff, four-pitch walk. Chase Utley jumped on a first-pitch fastball and singled. Ryan Howard looked at a first-pitch curveball strike, then sniffed out a fastball and drove it for an RBI single. Jayson Werth drew a five-pitch walk to load the bases.

The very good: Raul Ibanez came back from a 1-2 count and drew a nine-pitch walk for an RBI. He fouled off three two-strike pitches before taking a full-count curveball for the walk, his first of three on the night.

The bad: With the bases loaded, Pedro Feliz swung at a 1-1 slider off the plate and bounced it back to Hammel who started a 1-2-3 double play.

Good: With runners on second and third and two outs, Carlos Ruiz worked the count full, fouled off a fastball and a curveball before smacking a curveball into leftfield for an RBI single.

That Gonzalez guy again

The Rockies had 15 hits in the first two games and leftfielder Carlos Gonzalez had five of them. The rising star came through again last night, tying the game at 4-4 with a solo homer off Blanton in the fourth. Gonzalez, a lefthanded hitter, hit a 2-1 breaking ball into the rightfield seats.

Gonzalez also came through with a leadoff double against Scott Eyre in the seventh with the Rockies trailing 5-4. He went to third on a bunt hit by Dexter Fowler. Eyre was injured on the play and replaced by Ryan Madson.

Talk about difficult situations

Madson, a righthander, had to warm up in the cold and immediately face left-handed hitting Todd Helton, a career .328 hitter. Helton's career average against righthanders is .337.

Manuel chose Madson, a postseason veteran with two plus pitches (fastball and change-up) over his only remaining lefty, rookie Antonio Bastardo.

Madson responded by striking out Helton with 96 mph heat. But he couldn't stop the Rockies from getting the tying run on Troy Tulowitzki's sacrifice fly to left on a 1-2 change-up.

Big pickup

Both teams acquired pitching help from Cleveland in July. The Phils picked up Cliff Lee, who will pitch today. The Rockies got righthanded reliever Rafael Betancourt and he had a 1.78 ERA in 32 games.

Betancourt got his two biggest outs for the Rockies last night, striking out Ruiz and Matt Stairs as the Phillies left runners on second and third with the score tied at 5-5 in the top of the eighth.

Chess match

Trailing 5-4 with a runner on first and two outs in the sixth, Tracy sent pinch-hitter Seth Smith to the plate. Smith, a left-handed hitter, led the majors with a .472 average as a pinch-hitter and nine of his 17 pinch-hits were for extra bases.

When Smith was announced, Phils manager Charlie Manuel replaced Blanton with Eyre.

Eyre won the battle, getting Smith to pop up a 1-1 pitch to third base.

Playing matchups early

In the top of the fifth, with the score tied 4-4 and a runner on first, Tracy called on lefty Joe Beimel to face Howard. The Phillies' cleanup man made Beimel's life easy by swinging at the first pitch and popping out to shortstop.

Juggling the lineup

Tracy moved Yorvit Torrealba from sixth to fifth in the batting order because Torrealba had three hits, including a double and a homer, in the first two games. Tracy said he liked the possibility of Torrealba hitting with men on base in that spot. There were runners on base in each of Torrealba's first two at-bats. Happ struck him out in both.

Garrett Atkins moved from fifth to sixth and had an RBI single and an RBI double in his first two at-bats.

Contact staff writer Jim Salisbury at 215-854-4983 or jsalisbury@phillynews.com.