CHICAGO -- The Indians experienced a whirlwind over the last 72 hours, watching five of their teammates get traded, abruptly learning their manager would be taking a leave of absence for the remainder of the season and partaking in a benches-clearing incident on Friday.

But on Saturday, the club showed its not ready to throw in the towel just yet.

Cleveland overcame a five-run deficit and continued to fight off a menacing White Sox lineup to secure a 12-11 victory at Guaranteed Rate Field, preventing the Indians from dropping below .500 for the first time since May 2 when they were 12-13. But it certainly wasn’t easy.

“It’s just a good game back and forth, two competitive teams, just back and forth,” acting manager DeMarlo Hale said, “and it came down to who executed that last part of the game, whether it was defense or offense. I’m very proud of this team, the way they battled back, were down early, came back, took a big lead, a bigger lead, lost it, came back. That’s what teams are about.”

The Indians fell behind, 6-1, in the fourth inning, but proceeded to put up crooked numbers in the next four frames to take the lead. Doubles from Franmil Reyes and Oscar Mercado along with a single by Austin Hedges and a triple by Yu Chang provided a go-ahead five-spot in the sixth. The bats didn’t slow down there, as the club collectively recorded 10 extra-base hits -- a season high -- and the bottom third of the lineup combined to go 4-for-11 with two walks, five RBIs and three extra-base hits.

“They had some good at-bats,” Hale said. “I think when you look at them and moving forward, I think it was nice that they were able to barrel up some balls, use the whole field and really play in the moment there.”

It was a night that required a tremendous amount of offense to walk away victorious. Cleveland starter Triston McKenzie gave up six runs in four frames, Bryan Shaw permitted two more in one-third of an inning and James Karinchak was charged with three in one-third of a frame. But as the Indians’ offense held strong with each hitter logging at least one hit and eight of nine knocking in at least one run, so did Emmanuel Clase.

The Indians have rotated Clase and Karinchak through the eighth and ninth innings all season. This time, the plan was to have Karinchak work the eighth and leave Clase for the ninth. Instead, Karinchak could not complete his inning for the second consecutive night, leaving Clase to pick up a five-out save. And that’s exactly what he did.

“I was a little surprised because I know [Karinchak is] a really good pitcher and normally when he comes in, he always comes through his inning,” Clase said through interpreter Agustin Rivero. “So I was a little surprised that he wasn’t able to go through the batters this time, but I had to make the quick preparation and get ready, and that’s what I did.”

Cleveland needed some momentum to turn back in its favor. The team watched five of its players get traded over the last two days with just one new Major League-ready player added back on the roster. And on Thursday, the club received the news that skipper Terry Francona was going to miss the rest of the season to focus on his health.

“It’s a lot of emotions,” Clase said. “It’s really difficult to see your manager go away, but we understand it’s because of his health. There are a lot of emotions around, especially when we’ve been playing … for a while already. It’s an adjustment, but we have to make an adjustment and keep moving forward.”

The AL Central becomes more and more out of reach as the regular season slowly inches closer to its end. The Indians are eight games back of the first-place White Sox, and Cleveland will need to continue to eye the second AL Wild Card slot (currently 5 1/2 games behind the A’s) in its bid to make a postseason push.

The roster has gotten younger and younger as the season progressed, but this team knows it still has some fight left in it.

“This is what we got. We don’t have anybody else,” catcher Roberto Pérez said on Friday. “There’s a lot of guys in here that they’re hungry that want to play. They want to show what they got. We’re young. We understand that.

“What happened [Friday] with the Trade Deadline, guys the last couple of days, Tito, we’re gonna miss Tito. … But this is what we got and we just got to continue to do the little things, pitch, and just come ready to play every day.”