PHILADELPHIA — Like a guilty husband bringing home flowers in hopes of escaping the doghouse, Teoscar Hernandez made up for his transgression with an even better gift.

Hernandez’s poor effort on defense cost the Dodgers a run. That run looked like it might be the difference in Game 1 of their National League Division Series with the Philadelphia Phillies – until Hernandez produced a go-ahead three-run home run in the seventh inning that brought the Dodgers a 5-3 comeback win on Saturday night.

The best-of-five series will go dark on Sunday – the Super Bowl champion Eagles are hosting the Denver Broncos across the street at Lincoln Financial Field, tush-pushing the MLB playoffs out of the neighborhood. Game 2 is Monday at 3 p.m. PT.

They came back despite Shohei Ohtani giving up three runs in six innings in his postseason pitching debut – the first runs he has allowed since August – while striking out four times at the plate.

“I’m going to give the credit to our hitting coach,” veteran infielder Miguel Rojas said of the comeback win. “He called it earlier when we had the (hitters) meeting today. Aaron Bates said something to us, that it’s going to be there. The intensity and the fans were going to be there early in the game. Obviously they scored early. They punched us in the face right there. But we knew we were going to be winning in the seventh inning. He said it.

“He said that we were going to have an opportunity to come back in the game and it happened.”

Citizens Bank Park was rocking alright – on Wednesday night. The Phillies held an intrasquad scrimmage, trying to stave off the staleness of a five-day break and invited their fans. That became a very well-attended practice – practice? – when 31,000 showed up.

The atmosphere was even better Saturday. A sellout crowd made plenty of noise without Dr. Ken screaming at them from the scoreboard or the speaker volume threatening to put another crack in the Liberty Bell.

The Phillies responded by getting to Ohtani for those three runs in the second inning.

Ohtani lit the fuse by walking Alec Bohm to start the inning then gave up a single to Brandon Marsh – the Phillies’ first hit after six no-hit innings against Ohtani (five in his September start against them).

Both runners scored when J.T. Realmuto lined a triple into the right-center field gap. The ball went to the wall – but it shouldn’t have. Right fielder Teoscar Hernandez’s lackluster effort at cutting the ball off led to a third run when Realmuto scored from third on Harrison Bader’s sacrifice fly.

“I was playing straight in. I didn’t get a good angle,” Teoscar Hernandez said. “He hit it pretty good. I tried to get it, so he can’t go all the way to third or they can score two runs in that situation. It went by me.”

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts defended Hernandez’s defense by saying “he wasn’t not trying” but admitted “Yeah, that’s a ball that you don’t want Realmuto to have a triple.”

Ohtani allowed just one more hit in six innings and held the Phillies’ dangerous duo of Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper hitless in six at-bats against him, including four strikeouts.

“Prior to the game, just preparing for the game, just looking at the data, doing my usual preparation – I was a little nervous imagining myself out there on the mound,” Ohtani said through his interpreter. “But once I was on the mound and on the field, that went away and it was really me focusing.”

Hernandez’s faulty throttle was the difference when the Dodgers finally got to Sanchez in the sixth inning.

Tommy Edman singled to put two runners on for Kiké Hernandez who did what he does in October, coming through with a clutch hit. He drove in two with a double down the left field line, Edman roaring through third base coach Dino Ebel’s “stop” sign to score.

“It broke the seal,” Bates said. “And once you break that seal, it kind of opens the door for the rest of the guys. … You’re always kind of waiting for that big hit. And he got it with that double.”

Kiké Hernandez’s double did more than wake up the offense. It also drove Sanchez from the game.

With veteran setup man David Robertson on the mound in the seventh, Pages led off with a single and Robertson clipped Will Smith with a pitch to put two runners on.

Left-hander Matt Strahm came in and struck out Ohtani – Ohtani’s fourth strikeout of the game, the third on a called third strike.

“They have really quality arms coming out of the Phillies starting pitcher and bullpen,” Ohtani said. “And the fact that when I’m leading off, it does allow for the bullpen, the left-handed (relievers) bullpen to come out. That really gives Mookie and Teo, hitting behind me the opportunity to be able to hit. So in that sense, I felt like even though the results weren’t good, that I was able to contribute.”

At one point this season, the Dodgers started batting Teoscar Hernandez ahead of Freeman against left-handed pitching. Roberts called it the “Teo tax” – opposing managers who brought in lefties to face Ohtani would have to leave them in to face both Betts and Hernandez if they also wanted the left-on-left matchup against Freeman.

Strahm got Betts to pop out but then the tax came due. Strahm’s 91.8 mph fastball to Hernandez caught too much of the plate. Hernandez lined it into the right field seats for his fourth home run in three postseason games – and 394 feet of restitution.

“I watched videos. He likes to go up in the strike zone. I think that’s when he’s stronger,” Teoscar Hernandez said. “My first three at-bats (all strikeouts), I chased a lot of down.

“Not trying to overswing or anything like that. Maybe a hit. Try to bring in one run to tie the game. But he left it over the strike zone.”

That left nine outs for the Dodgers’ bullpen to get with a two-run lead – a tall task for the old bullpen but maybe not so much with the reconfigured group. Tyler Glasnow got the first five but handed the ball off to Alex Vesia with the bases loaded in the eighth. Vesia got pinch-hitter Edmundo Sosa to fly out and squash that threat.

Roki Sasaki got the ball in the ninth – his second ninth-inning appearance in the past two games but his first in a save situation. He gave up a one-out double to Max Kepler but closed it out.

“Honestly, I could have gone to a couple other guys in those spots,” Roberts said. “But just kind of knowing who I’ve got, I felt good about those guys we ran out there.”