Giants 4, Dodgers 3

SAN FRANCISCO -- The San Francisco Giants completed an early-season whitewashing of the National League West, sweeping a series from their fourth different opponent Sunday when Matt Cain's effective 7 1/3 innings and Hunter Pence's two doubles and three RBIs combined to take down the Los Angeles Dodgers 4-3 at AT&T Park.

The Giants, who took over the lead in the NL West with their sixth consecutive win, led wire-to-wire to complete the three-game weekend sweep after overcoming deficits and waiting until their last at-bat to beat their California rival with home runs the previous two nights.

The sweep followed similar hat-trick successes over the Colorado Rockies, San Diego Padres and Arizona Diamondbacks. The defending World Series champions also have been swept twice in their first 10 series, by the Milwaukee Brewers and the Padres.

Cain brought an 0-2 record and unsightly 6.49 ERA into Sunday's game. He now has a win, the product of stranding three Dodgers runners in scoring position in the first three innings as the Giants were building their lead, then settling into a season-best rhythm that saw him permit only two hits to the final 20 batters he faced. He wound up allowing five hits, three walks and one run while striking out four.

As it turned out, Cain did more sweating in the dugout than on the mound, as Giants relievers George Kontos and Jeremy Affeldt gave up three hits and a walk, producing three runs, after inheriting a two-out, one-on situation in the eighth.

Adrian Gonzalez got the big hit of the uprising for the Dodgers, a two-run, pinch single up the middle off fellow left-hander Affeldt to get the visitors on the scoreboard. The NL's sixth-leading hitter was making his first appearance in the series after having suffered a sore neck in a collision with an umpire while chasing a pop fly Wednesday in Colorado.

Dee Gordon's infield hit off Affeldt scored Juan Uribe with a third run in the inning, before Jean Machi, the Giants' fifth pitcher of the eighth, induced pinch hitter Jerry Hairston Jr. to ground out to shortstop on a full count with two runners aboard.

Sergio Romo navigated the top of the Dodgers order in the ninth inning without allowing a hit to earn his 12th save and cap the Giants' ninth one-run win of the season.

Pence saw to it the Giants wouldn't need to come from behind as they had in all five previous victories during their winning streak. His doubles drove in a run in the third and two more in the fifth, after his run-scoring infield out in the first inning gave Cain a lead he never relinquished.

Being on the losing end of a sweep for the second time this season, the Dodgers fell into a tie for last place in the NL West. Left-hander Hyun-Jin Ryu (3-2) took the loss, giving up four runs on eight hits over six innings to end a personal three-game winning streak.

Pence came to the plate with a total of seven runners on base in his first three at-bats, and he knocked in at least one run all three times.

His biggest hit came in the fifth. With two on and two outs in a 2-0 game, Pence lined a shot off the fence in right field. When Dodgers right fielder Andre Ethier tried to barehand the carom in an attempt to minimize the damage, he failed to field the ball cleanly, allowing both runners to score easily.

Pence's first at-bat almost ended the first inning rather than starting the scoring.

The Giants had a chance to get to Ryu big-time early, loading the bases with no outs on singles by Andres Torres, Marco Scutaro and Pablo Sandoval.

Buster Posey's grounder to third resulted in an out at the plate, and when Pence hit a similar ball, the Dodgers opted to go for an inning-ending double play. However, Pence hustled safely into first, plating Scutaro with the game's first run.

Pence's first double of the game came in the third inning, a two-out liner down the left field line that scored Scutaro from second base.

NOTES: The Giants began the game never having lost to the rival Dodgers in San Francisco when leading by three or more runs at any point in the game, a streak that dates back to 1958. ... The Dodgers plan to activate LHP Chris Capuano from the disabled list and start him Monday night against the Arizona Diamondbacks in the opener of a nine-game homestand. Capuano made only one start in April before suffering a strained left calf on April 16. ... After his two catchers hit walk-off homers in the first two games of the series, Giants manager Bruce Bochy found a way to start them both Sunday, with Saturday's hero Guillermo Quiroz behind the plate and Friday's game-winner Posey moving to first base. ... Giants leadoff man Angel Pagan was given the day off after straining his right hamstring in the outfield Saturday night. Pagan had started 29 of the Giants' first 30 games. ... Likewise, valuable Dodgers UT Jerry Hairston Jr., nursing a slight groin strain suffered running the bases Saturday, was not in manager Don Mattingly's starting lineup.