CHICAGO – Alfonso Soriano homered and made a great throw, and the Chicago Cubs scored a strange, go-ahead run in the eighth inning after Ken Griffey Jr. was injured to beat the Cincinnati Reds 3-2 on Wednesday night.

The Cubs began the day in a virtual tie with Milwaukee for the NL Central lead. The Brewers played at Houston and lost by a 5-4 score.

Soriano hit a leadoff homer in the first, then kept the score 2-all with his play in the eighth. Brandon Phillips hit a sharp single to left field that Soriano fielded, and his throw cut down the speedy Norris Hopper at the plate.

With one out in the Cubs eighth, Ryan Theriot singled and made it to second when Griffey fumbled the ball in right field for an error.

Derrek Lee followed with another single to right. As Griffey fielded the ball and started to make a throw, he stopped in pain. Griffey underhanded the ball back to the infield and fell to the ground as Theriot held third.

Griffey stayed down for several minutes and gingerly walked off with trainers at his side with a lower abdominal strain.

Mike Stanton replaced Gary Majewski (0-3) and pinch-hitter Matt Murton hit a sinking liner to left that Adam Dunn was ruled to have trapped. Dunn threw to second to force out Lee as Theriot scored.

Bob Howry (6-7) pitched two innings for the win.

Soriano and rookie Geovany Soto hit solo home runs off Tom Shearn. The Reds helped out the 30-year-old rookie by turning three double plays in his six innings.

Dunn hit his 40th homer and Edwin Encarnacion also connected off Ted Lilly. The left-hander went seven innings and gave up five hits and two runs while pitching on three days’ rest.

Soriano’s leadoff homer was his ninth the season, setting a Cubs’ franchise record. Rick Monday hit eight in 1976.

Soto, the Pacific Coast League Player of the Year, hit his second homer since being recalled on Sept. 1.

Like Carlos Zambrano on Tuesday night, Lilly worked on short rest so he could get two more starts in the final week and a half of the regular season. He gave up an infield hit to Hopper and a single to Jeff Keppinger to start the first, but escaped by getting Griffey to ground into a double play.

The Reds threatened again in the seventh when Dunn walked and Lee missed Joey Votto’s grounder to first base for an error, putting runners at the corners. Lilly struck out David Ross and pinch-hitter Alex Gonzalez, leaving the game tied.

Notes: Shearn spent 12 years in the minors before making his major league debut last month. He mixed an assortment of pitches at different speeds – in one three-pitch sequence, his offerings were clocked at 86 mph, 68 and then 74. … Mark DeRosa was 2-for-2 and is 14-for-15 in his last four games against the Reds. … Dunn’s homer was the 20th of his career at Wrigley Field.