CLEVELAND -- White Sox right fielder Andrew Vaughn felt very lucky during his team’s contest against the Guardians Friday night at Progressive Field.

The White Sox, as a team, couldn’t say the same.

After grabbing a two-run lead five hitters into the game, Chicago gave up five unanswered runs to the American League Central-leading Guardians in a 5-2 loss. The White Sox (61-59) fell for a third straight time, on the heels of two exciting comeback wins against Houston on Monday and Tuesday, and dropped 3 1/2 games out of first and 2 1/2 games behind the Twins for second.

Cleveland (64-55) now has a 9-5 edge in the season series between the two, meaning the Guardians need one win in their remaining four matchups to clinch a tiebreaker. As bad as things were results-wise in the final four innings, with the Guardians scoring one in the sixth and four in the seventh, the injury front was no better.

Luis Robert didn’t start for a seventh straight game with a left wrist sprain, and Eloy Jiménez exited in the eighth after twisting his right knee on a swing, which could cost him at least Saturday’s game. Vaughn, meanwhile, was hit by a Trevor Stephan pitch in that same eighth inning which glanced off his left shoulder area and then hit him square in the face.

Vaughn exited in the bottom of the eighth, but said he felt fine postgame and was ready for Saturday.

“Heck yeah. Might not look so good, but we’ll be out there,” Vaughn said. “I mean it’s definitely scary getting a ball at your head, but thank God it hit my shoulder first.

“Felt like I was fine. Don’t feel any symptoms or anything, just blood. I feel fine, honestly. If it didn’t hit the shoulder, we wouldn’t be talking right now. I feel lucky.”

White Sox manager Tony La Russa came out to check on Vaughn and had words for Cleveland catcher Luke Maile, who also attempted to check on the White Sox right fielder.

“I told him get away from him. You called for the pitch, just get away from him,” La Russa said. “Don't act like you care.

“It's been forever: if you don't have command, if you pitch inside, you get the ball down. It's not OK to say ‘Oh, I didn't mean to hit him intentionally, I just meant to get the ball up.’”

José Abreu and Yoán Moncada picked up run-scoring singles in the first off Cleveland starter Triston McKenzie, when they had the talented right-hander on the ropes. But Yasmani Grandal grounded into an inning-ending double play with runners on first and third, and in the fifth, when Josh Harrison opened with a double and moved to third on a wild pitch with nobody out, McKenzie struck out the side.

McKenzie struck out a career-high 14 without a walk. Three Guardians pitchers struck out 17 without issuing a free pass.

“Tough game,” Vaughn said. “Went up early, got some opportunities we didn’t cash in on, they took some good at-bats, got some runs together, ended up beating us.”

“You are not going to win every one of them,” said White Sox starting pitcher Lance Lynn, who allowed one run and struck out 6 over 5 2/3 innings. “If you beat yourself up over every loss, then it’s going to be a long season. We haven’t done that thus far, so we don’t plan on doing it now.”

That fateful four-run seventh came against relievers Reynaldo López and Jake Diekman and all four runs scored with two outs. It also included La Russa intentionally walking Oscar Gonzalez with a 1-2 count to load the bases after Andrés Giménez and Josh Naylor pulled off a double steal to leave first base open. Right-hander Jimmy Lambert replaced the southpaw Diekman to face right-handed hitting pinch-hitter Owen Miller, who flew out to right field.

All those twists and turns led to Cleveland taking the all-important Game 1 in what could be the White Sox biggest series of the year. It’s pretty important for the surprising, but hard-nosed Guardians, as well.

“We don't like the White Sox over here. We don't like the Tigers, we don't like the Royals, we don't like the Twins,” McKenzie said. “Anybody in the division. Anybody that has an opportunity to knock us out of first place, and those games really, really mean something, especially when we're playing in division late in the season, we want all these games."