Rafael Betancourt needed just six pitches to get through Youkilis, Ortiz and Ramirez in the eighth, then the righty finished off the Red Sox in the ninth.

Boston has been haunted by past Oct. 16 failures, and Blake’s leadoff homer in the fifth must have stirred painful memories across Red Sox Nation. It was on that date that New York’s Aaron Boone opened the 11th inning of Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS with a series-clinching homer — off Wakefield.

Blake, Cleveland’s clutch third baseman who has hit several big homers this season, drilled an 0-1 pitch over the wall in left. Franklin Gutierrez followed with a single and Wakefield plunked Kelly Shoppach. A groundout moved up Gutierrez, and Asdrubal Cabrera followed with a foul pop toward the photographer’s pit next to Boston’s dugout.

Youkilis, the first baseman, seemed to have it under control, but the ball squirted from his glove. Cabrera then hit a liner — a possible double-play ball — that Wakefield deflected and trickled behind the mound.

“It was hit right at me, but Wake stuck out his glove,” Pedroia said. “Things like that kind of happened all night. But we’re still alive and still playing. The opportunity is there.”

Wakefield was pulled after 4 2-3 innings — the third straight Red Sox starter to last exactly that long in this series. Manny Delcarmen couldn’t stop the Indians’ onslaught, either.

Peralta, Cleveland’s Mr. October 2007 with a .406 average and nine RBIs in the postseason, homered over the wall in right to make it 6-0. Kenny Lofton singled and stole second, his record-setting 34th career swipe in the postseason, and Blake, who started the outburst, dumped an RBI single.

At that point, Indians fans started thinking about what’s on deck for Cleveland — a chance to clinch a pennant at home after winning AL titles on the road in 1995 and 1997.

“It means a lot for us,” Victor Martinez said. “We’ve come a long way. To be in this spot right now, it’s amazing.”

Notes: By scoring seven runs in an inning twice in one series, the Indians matched the 1970 Baltimore Orioles, who did it against Minnesota. ... Of Cleveland’s 51 runs in the postseason, 27 have come with two outs. ... Youkilis was charged with an error on a pickoff attempt in the sixth, his first miscue in 1,644 chances dating to July 4, 2006.

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