BALTIMORE -- Regardless of how many wins the White Sox secure during the final three-and-a-half weeks of a historically difficult season, interim manager Grady Sizemore just wants his overmatched club to attempt to play its best possible baseball with the talent available.

On Wednesday night they did something close to that, and emerged salvaging an 8-1 victory over the AL East-contending Orioles in the series finale at Camden Yards to snap a 12-game slide.

“This is a night where it came together,” Sizemore said. “It was nice to get some balls falling in, and get good pitching and clean defense. That’s the way we want to play. It shows those guys how they can do it and try to repeat those kinds of efforts where we are playing clean, we’re having good at-bats and doing everything we need to do to win.”

A three-homer night, with Andrew Vaughn connecting for his team-leading 16th, and Nicky Lopez and Dominic Fletcher each hitting their first, is unlikely a repeatable method of victory for one of MLB’s worst power-hitting teams against one of its best.

But the far more consistent defense after what Sizemore admitted were “sloppy” displays in the first two games here is something that can be replicated as the White Sox (32-109) try to avoid passing the 1962 Mets’ record (40-120) for the most losses in a single season.

There was Fletcher’s excellent throw from right field to throw out Cedric Mullins trying to tag up from second base in the second inning.

Then came a swift throw-and-tag combination by catcher Chuckie Robinson and shortstop Jacob Amaya to catch Gunnar Henderson trying to steal second.

And then Luis Robert Jr. made a tricky leaping grab at the center-field wall to rob Mullins of potential extra bases in the fifth. (Roberts later left the game in the middle of the sixth inning with right hamstring tightness.)

Those plays all backstopped Jonathan Cannon's best outing since he threw seven innings of one-run ball to close his July.

“As a team we were just kind of clicking on all cylinders today,” said Cannon. “Offense, defense. And you know what? I think it's just a testament to the kind of guys we have on this team. Just professionals that are able to every day just flush what happened the day before and go out there and do the best we can.”

And there was also an offense that took advantage of getting multiple at-bats off O’s starter Albert Suárez (7-5) in short order, and also drove in runs against two of the Orioles’ lower leverage relievers.

The White Sox pounded out 15 total hits -- with eight starters registering at least one -- led by three-hit games from Lopez and Lenyn Sosa.

“Every win is good,” Lopez said. “It’s been tough this year to get those. But every win feels good. Especially because -- and I feel like a broken record -- we pull so hard for each other in here. It’s a close group and we haven’t been able to get over that hump.”

Cannon wasn’t as dominant as when he threw seven frames of one-run ball on July 30 in an unlucky no-decision against the Royals.

But he was consistently ahead and in the strike zone, two crucial traits to ensure he could work deeper into the game after White Sox relievers had to bridge 11 innings across Monday and Tuesday’s defeats.

“We've talked about in my last couple starts just being in bad counts, and just being behind,” Cannon said. “And that was just the biggest focus today, just to get ahead of these guys.”