The Red Sox departed Chicago with a 6-1 win on Sunday, avoiding a sweep against the major league-leading Cubs thanks to Wilyer Abreu’s two home runs and Alex Bregman’s one.

Wilyer Abreu homered twice and drove in three runs, and the Boston Red Sox beat the Chicago Cubs 6-1 to avoid a series sweep.

Alex Bregman, Wilyer Abreu hit home runs in the 8th inning that extended the Boston Red Sox's lead over the Chicago Cubs.

This was shaping up to be a disastrous start to the second half for the Red Sox, who couldn’t buy a run through the first two and a half games of this weekend’s series at Wrigley Field. Then Wilyer Abreu stepped to the plate in the top of the seventh,

Abreu missed a 93.5 mph sinker below the strike zone from Cubs reliever Ryan Pressly on his first-pitch bunt attempt. He then ripped the next pitch into the right field bleachers to give Boston its first lead of the three-game series after 24 innings tied or trailing.

The Red Sox advance to 54-47, keeping up in third place in the AL East and the third place spot in the Wild Card. Two dingers that were extremely important. One to break the scoring open and give us the lead and one that was just the exclamation point on a great victory.

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The Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs have some things in common — especially when it comes to the MLB trade deadline. Prior to Saturday’s game between the two teams, FOX Sports’ Ken Rosenthal identified Boston’s three biggest needs at the deadline. Coincidentally, Chicago is also in the market for the same type of players.