ST. PETERSBURG -- It was about three weeks ago when Red Sox manager Alex Cora, anticipating Trevor Story’s late-season return, said, “We’ll take the athlete.”

And there the athlete was at Tropicana Field on Wednesday night, when the Red Sox desperately needed a spark -- any type of spark.

Behind Story, the Sox edged out the Rays, 2-1, to get back to .500 and improve to 2-4 heading into the finale of a seven-game road trip. With the Twins losing, the Red Sox pulled back within four games of the third and final American League Wild Card spot.

It was Story who belted a game-tying homer against Ryan Pepiot, who was in the late stages of the best start of his career, and it was Story who led off the eighth with an infield hit, then stole second and third before scoring the go-ahead run on a single by Jarren Duran.

“We talk about the athlete,” said Cora. “We turned a nice double play, 5-6-3. [Triston] Casas did a good job at first, too. The 3-6-3. The homer, the stolen bases, that’s the player we envision. We’ve just got to keep him on the field.”

In Story’s first season in Boston in 2022, he was limited to 94 games due to a hairline fracture in his right hand and a left heel contusion.

Primed to be the starting shortstop following the departure of Xander Bogaerts in 2023, Story instead had to have right elbow surgery in the offseason and played just 43 games.

He seemed primed for a full load of games this year after his first healthy offseason in years, only to fracture his left shoulder in the eighth game of the season. To the surprise of everyone -- including Story -- it turned out not to be a season-ending injury despite the initial prognosis following surgery that he would be sidelined for six months.

Story pushed hard to bump up the timetable, and returned to action on Sept. 7.

While Boston’s offense was nearly shut down entirely by Pepiot (six innings, two hits, one run, no walks, 12 strikeouts), it was Story who came through with the big swing to lead off the sixth, hammering his second homer of the season at an exit velocity of 105.2 mph and a Statcast-projected distance of 394 feet.

“He was throwing the ball really well,” Story said of Pepiot. “He kind of had that exploding fastball and I missed underneath the first time. … He was throwing a lot of them, so I was ready for that next time around, and just tried to be direct and keep it simple and make things happen.”

Story made things happen again in the eighth. It started with some good fortune, as Story’s 57.7 mph grounder went off pitcher Drew Rasmussen’s body and into no-man’s land for a single. Then came the back-to-back stolen bases, which put Jarren Duran in position to belt a single into right to score Story and give the Red Sox the lead.

“You know, we do our preparation,” said Story. “And [first base coach Andy Fox], he lets us know the tendencies, and I took off. And then once [Enmanuel Valdez] flew out, I was trying to get to third base with one out. I had a feeling he was going to kind of no-look it and I got a good jump so that was it.”

On a night Boston improved to 9-52 when scoring less than four runs, the club won a game while scoring less than three runs for the first time since May 26 against the Brewers.

Even if the chances of making the postseason have grown slim for the Red Sox, Story will make sure the club gives max effort over the final 10 games.

“It’s big,” Story said. “Every win is big. Every time we come here, we're preparing, we're competing to win. This is the big leagues and we take that very seriously. We owe it to our fans. We owe it to ourselves. We owe it to everybody here to show up and try to make that happen.”

While Story was pretty much the whole offense, Tanner Houck made a strong return from right shoulder fatigue, holding the Rays to four hits and a run over four innings while pitching for the first time since Sept. 4.

Though things got dicey for Kenley Jansen in the ninth, he locked down career save No. 447 while battling some discomfort in his right shoulder.