By Austin McNabb

The Texas Rangers completed a three-game sweep of the Houston Astros at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington.

It was the first series win since late August for the Rangers, who are still in the AL wild-card hunt after Baltimore, Kansas City and the New York Yankees were eliminated the last two nights.

In game one, Rangers outfielder Alex Rios hit for the cycle as Texas dominated Houston 12-0. Rangers starting pitcher Derek Holland (10-9, 3.33 ERA) earned his first victory since August 4 after pitching a complete game, giving up zero runs.  On the other hand, after giving up nine runs in his last outing, Astros starting pitcher Jordan Lyles (7-9, 5.59 ERA) gave up seven runs in just three innings of work.

After not having hit a home run in almost a month, Rangers slugger Adrian Beltre hit a home run in the sixth inning, giving Texas the lead and win 3-2 on Tuesday.

In Wednesday’s series finale, Texas scored five runs in the fourth inning as the Rangers beat the Astros 7-3. Rangers second baseman Ian Kinsler had two RBIs for the night including a solo home run in the sixth inning.

Not only did Houston (51-108) lose the season series 17-2, but they suffered their 12^th loss in a row.

With the last round of regular season series in Major League Baseball, Tampa Bay is currently sitting in the top seed in the AL wild card by one game, followed by the second wild-card seed, Cleveland. The Rangers are still one game outside of the wild card.

Texas will finish its final regular season series at home against their AL West foes, the Los Angeles Angels, in a four-game series.