PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Mike Soroka struck out 10, closer Paul Sewald retired Trea Turner to end the game and strand the tying run at third base, and the Arizona Diamondbacks beat the Philadelphia Phillies 5-4 on Friday night.
Sewald gave up a two-out triple off the top of the right-field wall to rookie Justin Crawford. Sewald recovered to get Turner — last season's NL batting champion — on a flyball to end the game and earn his fourth save.
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Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh, left, celebrates after his three-run home run with Bryce Harper, center, and Kyle Schwarber, right, during the first inning of a baseball game against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Arizona Diamondbacks starting pitcher Mike Soroka, center, looks down as pitching coach Brian Kaplan, left, and catcher Gabriel Moreno, right, come out to talk to him after the three-run home run by Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh during the first inning of a baseball game, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Arizona Diamondbacks' James McCann hits a a two-run double during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Philadelphia Phillies, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh, left, celebrates after his three-run home run with Bryce Harper, center, and Kyle Schwarber, right, during the first inning of a baseball game against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Arizona Diamondbacks' Ketel Marte hits a two-run single during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Philadelphia Phillies, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh, left, runs the bases after hitting a three-run home run off Arizona Diamondbacks starting pitcher Mike Soroka (34) during the first inning of a baseball game, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Arizona Diamondbacks starting pitcher Mike Soroka, center, looks down as pitching coach Brian Kaplan, left, and catcher Gabriel Moreno, right, come out to talk to him after the three-run home run by Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh during the first inning of a baseball game, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
The NL East champion Phillies opened a nine-game homestand with their third straight loss and fourth in five games. They struck out 16 times against four Diamondbacks pitchers.
Phillies starter Jesús Luzardo — who struck out 11 without a walk in his last start in Colorado — took a no-hitter into the fifth and was staked to a 4-0 lead.
Eight batters later, he was yanked as Arizona lead 5-4.
Ketel Marte started the scoring with a two-RBI single and Ildemaro Vargas added a run-scoring single to make it 4-3. Brandon McCann, who took over catching duties in the third after Gabriel Moreno left with lower-back tightness, lined a two-RBI double to right for the 5-4 lead that chased Luzardo (1-2)
The Phillies were outscored 11-0 in consecutive games by San Francisco and had been scoreless in 20 straight innings overall to end their six-game road trip.
The shutout streak ended in a hurry against Soroka (3-0).
The Phillies got the instant offense out of the top of the order they've lacked most of the season. Turner singled, Kyle Schwarber walked and Bryce Harper lined an RBI double for a 1-0 lead.
Brandon Marsh, batting cleanup for the first time this season, hit a three-run homer to left for a 4-0 lead and the Phillies seemed primed to blow the game open.
Soroka, who had allowed only one run over his first 10 innings pitched, instead settled into a groove and gave up just two more hits and no runs over his final 4 2/3 innings.
Arizona sends RHP Brandon Pfaadt (0-0, 6.75 ERA) to the mound against Phillies RHP Taijuan Walker (0-2, 9.31 ERA). Walker's spot in the rotation is likely in jeopardy with ace Zack Wheeler expected to make one or two more rehab starts for Double-A Reading. Wheeler's 2025 season ended in August because of a blood clot near his right shoulder.
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Arizona Diamondbacks' James McCann hits a a two-run double during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Philadelphia Phillies, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh, left, celebrates after his three-run home run with Bryce Harper, center, and Kyle Schwarber, right, during the first inning of a baseball game against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Arizona Diamondbacks' Ketel Marte hits a two-run single during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Philadelphia Phillies, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh, left, runs the bases after hitting a three-run home run off Arizona Diamondbacks starting pitcher Mike Soroka (34) during the first inning of a baseball game, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
Arizona Diamondbacks starting pitcher Mike Soroka, center, looks down as pitching coach Brian Kaplan, left, and catcher Gabriel Moreno, right, come out to talk to him after the three-run home run by Philadelphia Phillies' Brandon Marsh during the first inning of a baseball game, Friday, April 10, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Chris Szagola)
HOUSTON (AP) — Artemis II’s astronauts returned from the moon with a dramatic splashdown in the Pacific on Friday to close out humanity’s first lunar voyage in more than a half-century.
It was a triumphant homecoming for the crew of four whose record-breaking lunar flyby revealed not only swaths of the moon’s far side — never seen before by human eyes — but a total solar eclipse. They emerged from their bobbing capsule into the sunlight one by one.
Commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Canada’s Jeremy Hansen hit the atmosphere traveling Mach 33 — or 33 times the speed of sound — a blistering blur not seen since NASA’s Apollo moonshots of the 1960s and 1970s. Their Orion capsule, dubbed Integrity, made the plunge on automatic pilot.
The tension in Mission Control mounted as the capsule became engulfed in red-hot plasma during peak heating and entered a planned communication blackout.
All eyes were on the capsule’s life-protecting heat shield that had to withstand thousands of degrees during reentry. On the spacecraft’s only other test flight — in 2022, with no one on board — the shield’s charred exterior came back looking as pockmarked as the moon.
Like so many others, lead flight director Jeff Radigan anticipated feeling some of that “irrational fear that is human nature,” especially during the six-minute blackout that preceded the opening of the parachutes. The recovery ship USS John P. Murtha awaited the crew’s arrival off the coast of San Diego, along with a squadron of military planes and helicopters.
The astronauts’ families huddled in Mission Control’s viewing room, where cheers erupted when the capsule emerged from its communication blackout and again at splashdown.
“A perfect bull’s-eye splashdown,” reported Mission Control’s Rob Navias.
Launched from Florida on April 1, the astronauts racked up one win after another as they deftly navigated NASA’s long-awaited lunar comeback, the first major step in establishing a sustainable moon base.
Artemis II didn't land on the moon or even orbit it. But it broke Apollo 13's distance record and marked the farthest that humans have ever journeyed from Earth when the crew reached 252,756 miles (406,771 kilometers). Then in the mission's most heart-tugging scene, the teary astronauts asked permission to name a pair of craters after their moonship and Wiseman's late wife, Carroll.
During Monday's record-breaking flyby, they documented scenes of the moon's far side never seen before by the human eye along with a total solar eclipse. The eclipse, in particular, “just blew all of us away,” Glover said.
Their sense of wonder and love awed everyone, as did their breathtaking pictures of the moon and Earth. The Artemis II crew channeled Apollo 8's first lunar explorers with Earthset, showing our Blue Marble setting behind the gray moon. It was reminiscent of Apollo 8’s famous Earthrise shot from 1968.
“We are back in the business of sending astronauts to the moon, bringing them back safely and to set up for a series more," NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said Friday from the recovery ship. "This is just the beginning.”
Their moonshot drew global attention as well as star power, earning props from President Donald Trump; Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney; Britain's King Charles III; Ryan Gosling, star of the latest space flick “Project Hail Mary”; Scarlett Johansson of the Marvel Cinematic Universe; and even Captain Kirk himself, William Shatner of TV’s original “Star Trek.”
Despite its rich scientific yield, the nearly 10-day flight was not without technical issues. Both the capsule’s drinking water and propellant systems were hit with valve problems. In perhaps the most high-profile predicament, the toilet kept malfunctioning, but the astronauts shrugged it all off.
“We can’t explore deeper unless we are doing a few things that are inconvenient,” Koch said, “unless we’re making a few sacrifices, unless we’re taking a few risks, and those things are all worth it.”
Added Hansen: “You do a lot of testing on the ground, but your final test is when you get this hardware to space and it’s a doozy.”
Under the revamped Artemis program, next year’s Artemis III will see astronauts practice docking their capsule with a lunar lander or two in orbit around Earth. Artemis IV will attempt to land a crew of two near the moon’s south pole in 2028.
The Artemis II astronauts' allegiance was to those future crews, Wiseman said.
“But we really hoped in our soul is that we could for just for a moment have the world pause and remember that this is a beautiful planet and a very special place in our universe, and we should all cherish what we have been gifted,” he said.
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
In this photo provided by NASA, the Orion spacecraft with Artemis II crewmembers aboard approaches the surface of the Pacific Ocean for splashdown off the coast of California, Friday, April 10, 2026. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)
In this photo provided by NASA, the Orion spacecraft with Artemis II crewmembers aboard approaches the surface of the Pacific Ocean for splashdown off the coast of California, Friday, April 10, 2026. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)
In this image from video provided by NASA, the Artemis II Orion capsule splashes down in the Pacific Ocean, on Friday, April 10, 2026. (NASA via AP)
In this photo provided by NASA, U.S. Navy divers prepare to deploy in small boats from the well deck of USS John P. Murtha to recover Artemis II crew members NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, commander; Victor Glover, pilot; Christina Koch, mission specialist; and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen, mission specialist and NASA's Orion spacecraft in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California, Friday, April 10, 2026. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)
In this image from video provided by NASA, the Artemis II Orion capsule, right, separates from the service module above the Earth in preparation for splash down in the Pacific Ocean. (NASA via AP)
In this image provided by NASA, the Artemis II crew, counterclockwise from top left, Mission Specialist Christina Koch, Mission Specialist Jeremy Hansen, Commander Reid Wiseman, and Pilot Victor Glover pose with eclipse viewers during a lunar flyby, Monday, April 6, 2026. (NASA via AP)
In this image provided by NASA, the Artemis II crew photographed the Moons curved limb during their journey around the far side of the Moon on April 6, 2026. (NASA via AP)
In this image provided by NASA, the Artemis II crew photographed a bright portion of the Moon on April 6, 2026. (NASA via AP)
In this image provided by NASA, the Artemis II crew captured this view as the Earth sets behind the Moon during a lunar flyby, Monday, April 6, 2026. (NASA via AP)
