via d.yimg.com

Daisuke Matsuzaka knows when to kick it up a notch. Tonight, with all eyes on him, he did that -- and more.

After walking the bases loaded in the first inning, Matsuzaka buckled down and dominated the Rays for 7 innings to give the Sox a 2-0 victory over the Rays in game one of the ALCS.

Dice-K had a no-hitter going through 6 innings before finally giving up the first to Carl Crawford in the 7th. He allowed the first two base runners in the 8th before he was yanked, but no one can argue with this line: 4 hits, 0 runs, 4 walks and 9 strikeouts.

Simply put: he was amazing. He was what we wanted out of our No. 1 starter in this series.

Offensively, the Sox struggled against Rays starter James Shields. Shields hit his spots but the Sox seemed to adapt. Jed Lowrie hit a sac fly in the fifth to score Jason Bay and give the Sox a 1-0 lead. In the 8th, Kevin Youkilis doubled to score Dustin Pedroia. Youk had 3 hits on the game.

The Sox certainly weren't impressive at the plate, but it was just good enough. Had Dice-K pitched average tonight, the Rays would be up 1-0 in this series. But the Sox offense did what they had to do to win.

Dice-K set the tone just like Jon Lester did in the ALDS. The difference here is the fact we expected that out of Lester, but not Dice-K. We wanted 'good' out of Dice-K tonight but we got 'great.' He delivered like the big game pitcher he is.

The wind had to be knocked out of the Rays' sails after tonight. I think they expected to work Dice-K, get on base, run and get across the plate. But it didn't happen. The momentum has definitely swung in the Red Sox's favor.

Tomorrow it's Josh Beckett versus Scott Kazmir. It should be a great game.

Go Sox!

Here we are again -- the ALCS. I love it. Let's show the Rays who's boss. Sound good?

The starters:

And the lineups:

Go Sox!!!

via www.projo.com

And they meet again.

The Boston Red Sox versus the best team in the American League East, the Tampa Bay Rays. There is no doubt in my mind that this is one of the best ALCS match-ups I've seen in recent history. Something about this rivalry just makes it stand out.

No, it's not Red Sox and Yankees. But it's the Rays -- the Rays -- and the Red Sox. Not a Rays team that is overachieving a little -- they are overachieving big time. But I'm not saying the Rays are a bad team. That's far from the truth. It's just that no one really expected them to be here.

Not this year, at least.

We always knew this Rays team would be nasty in a few years and we seemed to make that statement every year. But did anyone expect it to smack us in the face so face? Did anyone expect the Rays to be the hottest team in baseball come October? No one expected it, but that's what we've got.

Will we see punches traded out on the mound? Probably not. Not at this point of the game. There's too much at risk. Imagine if James Shields blazes a fastball past the chinny-chin-chin of Coco Crisp? The crowd is going to erupt with "Oooooh!"' but I don't think we'll see anything.

This series will come down to the pitching. If the Red Sox starters pitch like they are capable of, the Rays will have a hard time. If the Rays' starters blow up from pressure, the Sox should stroll. But of course, the Rays starters could be absolutely lights out -- like they were all season long -- and frustrate the Sox.

I guess we'll just find out at 8 p.m. tonight.

But what we are going to see is going to be a great series. It's like an ol' fashion title bout with everything at stake:

Iiiiiin this corner we have the young, spunky, never-gonna-die-even-if-ya-tryyyyyyy, up and coming, top of the mountaaaaiiiin, fighter of the year ... The Rays!

Iiiiiin this corner we have the defending heavy weight champion of the wooooooooooorld ... the savvy veteran, the still quick-as-a-cat pounder. Before you can call yourself champioooooon, you gotta' beat this guyyyyyyy ... the Red Sox!

It all comes down to this. It's a battle of new vs. old. If the Rays win, the face of baseball will forever be changed. If the Red Sox win, it just proves how good this team is. No matter what though, someone will win. And no matter what, it will be big.

Don't worry. This time, these questions and answers are pretty solid. RJ Anderson from DRaysBay.com, the SBN Rays blog, answered some questions for me just in time for game one of the ALCS.

Just about everybody sings Evan Longoria's tune, so probably Carlos Pena or B.J. Upton.

Andy Sonnanstine. Being the game four starter signifies he's not as good as the other three starters, yet the guy gave the Red Sox some fits the last two times he faced them.

Heavens no, I was hoping for 85 wins, not along playoff and potential World Series hopes.

Of course. Although my definition of making a difference is anytime you can get satanic worshippers to disown you

Defense as usual.

I really want to say hitting, which would mean the pitching remains stellar, but I've got a bad feeling one of the starters won't last long.

Winner goes on to take the World Series as well. Hopefully Rays in seven, or less.

One last thing: Go Sox! (I said that, not RJ, of course).

Terry Francona announced the Red Sox rotation today for the ALCS against the Tampa Bay Rays:

Game 1: Daisuke Matsuzaka
Game 2: Josh Beckett
Game 3: Jon Lester
Game 4: Tim Wakefield
Game 5: Matsuzaka
Game 6: Beckett
Game 7: Lester

The best pitcher we've had in the postseason is guaranteed to only pitch one game and it's the third one. However, if the series does go all seven we've got our best to pitch that game. It's bittersweet.

Thoughts on the rotation?

Let's do this. Go Sox!

Youk is safe at first. Oh, wait. Out? (via d.yimg.com)

I'll say it: that sucked.

I'm not going to say the Red Sox sucked, though. Josh Beckett, coming off an injury, did all he could. He wasn't the postseason Beckett we know and love, but he gutted it out. What sucks is that the Sox had the opportunity to end this series in a clean sweep and didn't happen. Now a game four is forced and, if the Angels win it, we have to deal with the rally monkey again.

The friggin' rally monkey.

None of you want that. I know you.

Not a lot went wrong tonight. The Red sox didn't look terrible. The bottom line is, this guy hit way too many home runs. Two too many, actually. If it wasn't for him, the Sox could have won this game.

I must give credit to the Angels, though. They didn't quit. They could have packed their bags with Beckett on the mound but they played like the team they looked like all season long. They fought. It's admirable. They're a professional baseball team and the played like it. Congrats.

Now all eyes turn to Jon Lester. Can he do it again? It will be hard, to say the least, for him to be as good as he was in game one. It's certainly possible, but the deck is stacked against him. The Angels have seen him once and have watched the video every day since then. He can do it, but he has to be even better.

The thing that hurts about this game is that the Red Sox were so close to winning this game. They didn't get blown out. It was attainable in innings one through 12. One clutch hit was all it was going to take. It just didn't happen.

Big props to the bullpen tonight. Javier Lopez, the fifth option out of the 'pen, blew the tie game in extras. But, as we all know, J-Lo isn't that great. He's good at what he does -- facing one or two batters -- but outside of that he struggles. I would have liked to see Paul Byrd in that situation, but I understand Terry Francona's choice in Lopez.

The series is extended one more game, unfortunately. But I don't think the Sox have lost any steam heading into game four. It's still theirs to take and with Lester going I'm sure everyone has confidence.

Go Sox!

The Red Sox need one more victory to guarantee a trip to the American League Championship Series. Might as well do it tonight. Go Sox!

The starters:

Post the lineups when you got 'em!

Go Sox!