PHOENIX -- The length of Tuesday night’s 19-inning loss to the D-backs left the Cardinals in a precarious situation on Wednesday afternoon, and the past two days in Arizona have put them in a similar situation heading home for the final weekend of the regular season.

Following Tuesday’s 6-hour, 53-minute marathon, manager Mike Shildt left all but one regular out of the starting lineup on Wednesday. The “bench mafia,” as the Cardinals like to call it, provided a spark early, but eventually the offense wore off and a seven-run inning from the D-backs sunk the Cards in a 9-7 loss.

• Box score

The loss shrunk the Cardinals’ lead in the National League Central over the Brewers to 1 1/2 games and sends them back to St. Louis still eyeing the division title -- with three games against the Cubs set for this weekend. The Cards potentially could have clinched the division while in Arizona, but the two losses kept their magic number at three with three games to go in the regular season.

“Pressure’s either felt or pressure’s applied,” Shildt said. “This group doesn’t particularly enjoy feeling any pressure, we like to apply it. We’ll play like we played all year, and we embrace the opportunity. We look forward to getting home and playing on Friday night.”

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The Cardinals sat in a 2-0 deficit after Michael Wacha exited the game in the second inning with tightness in his right shoulder. They tied the score on José Martínez’s two-run double in the third inning, and took the lead and extended it thanks to a few highlight-reel plays from center fielder Randy Arozarena.

Arozarena stole home in the fourth inning, becoming the first Cardinal to steal home since Pete Kozma on Sept. 21, 2012, against the Cubs. In the fifth inning, Arozarena launched a perfect throw to third base to nab Adam Jones, and he followed that throw with his first Major League home run to lead off the sixth inning and put the Cards up three.

But a decisive bottom of the sixth saw the D-backs score seven runs on three hits, helped in part by errors from third baseman Tommy Edman and catcher Matt Wieters.

Still, the Cardinals had chances to come back. They put two on in the eighth before Edmundo Sosa grounded out, and they scored two in the ninth and had the potential go-ahead run at the plate in pinch-hitter Paul Goldschmidt, who grounded into a double play to end the game.

“We were ready to go,” Goldschmidt said.

Shildt said before the game that the regulars would be available to pinch-hit if needed on Wednesday, but Matt Carpenter, Harrison Bader (double-switched into center field in the fifth) and Goldschmidt were the only three who did. Even when St. Louis had runners on base in the eighth and ninth, Shildt stuck with Wednesday’s starters while Goldschmidt, Marcell Ozuna, Paul DeJong and Dexter Fowler lined the dugout fence.

Had the game continued past Goldschmidt’s at-bat, Shildt said, Ozuna and DeJong would have seen action.

“I think we were hands off because of the guys who went out there and played well,” Shildt said. “We scored seven runs. We did have a few errors, which is uncharacteristic, but there wasn’t a spot ... We put our best team out there today. We put our best group out there and are really pleased with the representation that we got.”

The Cardinals finished a stretch of 16 games without an off-day. A seven-day road trip within that span included four one-run games against the Cubs at Wrigley Field and Tuesday’s 19-inning marathon. The Cards finished the stretch 9-6 and the road trip 5-2, all while clinching a postseason berth and hanging onto their division lead.

Because every regular played almost all of the 15 games leading up to Wednesday, and all 19 innings on Tuesday, Shildt saw Wednesday as an opportunity to make sure his players were fresh heading into the season's final weekend.

“There was nothing about today’s game that indicated that we weren’t all in,” Shildt said. “Zero. Nothing. People can have an opinion about what all-in looks like. But I can tell you this: We went out, we scored seven runs, we had the chance for the go-ahead run and Paul Goldschmidt at the plate, eight hours after we played a seven-hour game on the road in 16 straight. If you want more than that, I’d like to see you conjure it up. That’s a Herculean effort.”