Guardians advance to ALDS on Gonzalez's walk-off HR in 15th

The Cleveland Guardians defeated the Tampa Bay Rays 1-0 to advance to the American League Division Series thanks to a walk-off home run from Oscar Gonzalez in the 15th inning on Saturday.

The 24-year-old rookie was one of 17 players to debut for baseball's youngest team this season. It was almost fitting that one of the team's youngest players was responsible for the game-winner, which gave Cleveland a 2-0 series victory in the wild-card round.

"I don't think by that point we cared," manager Terry Francona said when asked if it was almost perfect for Gonzalez to record the hit, according to ASAP Sports. "It could have been one of the old guys. We didn't care. We're not biased. I was happy that he hit it."

Before the homer, Saturday's Game 2 set the record for the longest scoreless postseason game in major-league history.

Gonzalez's blast, which came off Rays right-hander and former Cleveland ace Corey Kluber, is the 13th walk-off homer to clinch a postseason series and the first in Cleveland playoff history, according to MLB.com's Sarah Langs.

The contest featured 39 combined strikeouts, which is two more than in any other game in postseason history, according to Langs.

The Rays were responsible for 20 of those strikeouts. Tampa Bay also struck out nine times during Friday's 2-1 loss. The team mustered one run and nine hits across 24 innings in the series.

"Yeah, it's frustrating, no doubt," Rays manager Kevin Cash said.

"We just could not get anything going offensively - a bunch of strikeouts. They pitched really, really well. I'd like to think that we could have some better at-bats. But this two-game series, you saw about as good pitching as you're going to see," Cash continued.

"On the other side, I'll speak for our club: We're capable of more, we just couldn't get going."

Cleveland moves on to play the New York Yankees. The Guardians were 1-5 against the Bronx Bombers during the regular season, with New York outscoring them 38-14.