By Kahlil Najar

Oakland, Calif. – The A’s scored three runs in the bottom of the ninth to beat the Astro’s 4-3 and earn their 80th win of the year. Jed Lowrie smacked a single to left field off of Chad Qualls to bring in Josh Reddick for his first walk off hit with the Athletics.

“It was great! If you don’t experience that here, you haven’t really had the full A’s experience,” said Lowrie on his walk off hit.

The bottom of the ninth saw three A’s who were in a bit of a slump come up big at the right time. Josh Donaldson led off the inning with a single which snapped his 0 for 15 hitless streak. Josh Reddick who had a hit early in the game hit his 13th double of year on a long shot to center that brought in Donaldson and Burns who had got on base from a hit from Norris and tie the game at 3. Then of course Lowrie who in the last 15 games is now batting .344 with 10 runs and nine RBI.

Reddick took to Twitter to speak on the game.

“Wow we needed that win! That was awesome to be a part of! Let that be the start of the comeback!!!”

Lowrie continued, “We just need to keep that momentum, use that momentum moving forward, continue to believe what we set out to do from the beginning.”

Bob Melvin echoed his players sentiments later on.

“We’ve won many games like that this year, so hopefully they remember the feeling.”

Scott Kazmir who ended up with a no-decision had a great game. Kaz went 6 1/3 innings and only gave up three hits and two runs and eight strikeouts. In fact, his seven strikeouts in five innings matched his total strike outs from his last three starts combined.

“I think this is big for us. I think we needed a win kind of like this. You could look at everyone in this clubhouse, between all of us, we wanted this real bad. I think there were a couple games where I felt like the energy level just wasn’t there. It’s to the point where we just got to, you got to dig deep and finish strong. I feel like a win like this is something that could kick-start us,” said Kazmir.

Reddick summed up the day with this, “Our losses have been ugly, so to come back like this is hopefully something that gets us going…because that’s what we need right now.”

The Astros and A’s head back at it on Sunday when the Astros send Dallas Keuchel (10-9, 3.03 ERA) against Jason Hammel (2-5, 4.98 ERA).

OAKLAND NOTES

• The Oakland Athletics recorded their ninth walk-off win of the season (last: August 4 vs. Tampa Bay)…are 2-3 on this six-game homestand against Seattle (1-2) and Houston (1-1).

• Scott Kazmir tossed 6.1 innings and issued a season-high five walks…is now 3-3 with a 4.86 ERA (29 er in 53.2 ip) in 10 starts against American League West competition compared to 11-4 with a 2.73 ERA (34 er in 112.0 ip) against all other teams.

• Josh Donaldson (1 for 4, r) snapped his 0 for 15 hitless streak with a single in the ninth inning…is 2 for 20 (.100) on the homestand after hitting safely in all seven games on the last road trip (12 for 24, .500).

• Sam Fuld (0 for 3, r, so) is 10 for 56 (.179) over his last 21 games.

• Jed Lowrie (2 for 4, rbi, so) recorded his first walk-off RBI of the season .. .is batting .344 (21 for 61) with 10 runs, nine RBI and seven walks in 15 games against Houston…is a .320 (41 for 128) career hitter against the Astros.

• Brandon Moss (0 for 3, rbi, so, sf) is 5 for 47 (.106) with 12 walks and 21 strikeouts over his last 17 games…has not homered since July 24 and his 34-game homerless streak is the longest as an Athletic.

• Derek Norris (1 for 4, 2 so) is 6 for 18 (.333) over his last five games after going 9 for 61 (.148) over his previous 18 games.

• Eric Sogard (1 for 3) is batting .278 (32 for 115) at home compared to .173 (23 for 133) on the road.