It had been 57 days since the D-backs last won back-to-back games and 66 since they’d won a series, enduring a 24-game losing streak during that time frame as players transitioned to and from the injured list.

But following Wednesday’s 6-4 win over the Rockies at Chase Field, which guaranteed a series victory for the first time since May 2 and their first back-to-back wins since May 10-11, the D-backs are ready to begin a new streak. A winning one.

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“It's what we've been working hard for,” manager Torey Lovullo said. “It's what we've been waiting for, and nobody was handing it to us. We had to go out there and earn it.

“No Major League win is an easy win.”

To get there, the D-backs needed strong pitching and quality at-bats. Humberto Castellanos, making his first Major League start, set the tone with four scoreless innings, striking out two in the process on 60 pitches (42 strikes).

“He took advantage of an opportunity tonight,” Lovullo said. “He went four scoreless innings and just had really good mound presence. You have to remember he's a young kid. [He] threw up a quality at-bat as well.”

Sporting a five-pitch mix, Castellanos mixed in his sinker, curveball, four-seam fastball, slider and changeup, helping to generate 14 called strikes and swings-and-misses in his outing. Additionally, he generated six ground-ball outs and three fly-ball outs to keep the Rockies off the scoreboard, including an inning-ending double-play to wrap up his first start.

“He was switching speeds, front to back, side to side, up and down,” Lovullo said. “[He] just made the ride bumpy.”

Arizona opened the scoring in the second inning on RBI singles from Nick Ahmed and Daulton Varsho. Castellanos, the 23-year-old right-hander, helped his own cause, driving a fastball 354 feet to deep center for a long sacrifice fly in his first Major League plate appearance.

In all, Arizona added three runs on four hits, all singles, and none hit harder than 102.1 mph. What they did do, however, was put the D-backs in the driver’s seat and allow Matt Peacock, pitching in relief for Castellanos, to fire three innings of one-run ball with two strikeouts.

“We had a couple of guys we felt comfortable putting in there for length, and Matt did a tremendous job,” Lovullo added. “Matt was throwing the fastball-slider combination and keeping some really good hitters off balance.”

Eduardo Escobar, the D-backs’ All-Star Game representative, added three insurance runs in the seventh inning when he hit his 19th homer of the season.

“I was ready for the lefty, but they brought in the righty,” Escobar said. “Anytime with runners in scoring position, I’ll be aggressive with my bat. He threw me a fastball right there, and I didn’t miss.”

Those three insurance runs would prove to be major as the Rockies added three runs in the eighth inning on three hits and two fielding errors before the D-backs could record an out.

“He continues to have big hits for us, and he takes a 3-1 game and makes it 6-1 with one swing of the bat, and that's what we're looking for,” Lovullo said of Escobar’s crucial homer. “You can see he's our All-Star, so he was the right guy at the right time, and we needed that. You can see where the game ended up score-wise, but it was a good team effort.”

Brett de Geus helped end the eighth-inning rally, and Joakim Soria closed out the win in the ninth.

The D-backs now head into Thursday’s series finale with their first winning streak in some time, and with several key players gearing up for potential returns after the All-Star break.

“You can't really predict what's going to happen day to day, and this group has walked through a lot,” Lovullo said. “It's been resilient. It's been mentally tough. The game gave us something back when it wasn't being kind to us.

“It’s put us in a good spot to go out tomorrow and win three games in a row, but we have to rest up and make sure we're ready to play. It's gonna be a tough day tomorrow with this quick turnaround.”