ST. LOUIS — Trevor Williams pitched six strong innings, Starling Marte had an RBI single in the sixth inning, and the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the St. Louis Cardinals 2-0 Wednesday night.

Williams (11-9) gave up three hits and struck out a career-high eight. He has allowed just four earned runs over his last eight starts and improved to 5-2 with 0.75 ERA during that stretch. He has a major-league best eight starts of at least five innings without allowing a run.

Marte lifted a bloop single to left field off Miles Mikolas (13-4) to bring in Jordy Mercer with the first run. Gregory Polanco followed with a run-scoring single to help Pittsburgh win for just the second time in eight games.

Edgar Santana and Keone Kela each pitched and inning, and Felipe Vazquez got the last three outs for his 28th save.