The Texas Rangers looked to their ace Jacob deGrom Sunday, hoping a dominant performance could give the Rangers their second-straight win against the Chicago Cubs — who came into Arlington riding a 10-game winning streak.

Mission accomplished.

DeGrom was superb in the Rangers’ 3-0 win against the Cubs on Mother’s Day at Globe Life Field.

The Rangers entered Sunday’s with one of MLB’ss worst offenses, ranking third-worst in runs scored. The Cubs, meanwhile, entered the game with the best record in baseball, at 27-13; they’ll leave town on a two-game losing streak, getting shut out in back-to-back games.

With their victory, the Rangers are only three games out of first place in the American League West and only 0.5 games out of the final AL Wild Card spot.

Here are three takeaways from the Rangers-Cubs series finale.

Jacob deGrom makes history

DeGrom entered Sunday’s game with 1,898 strikeouts, only two short of 1,900, and became the second-fastest player in MLB to reach the number in the first inning. He hit 1,900 in 256 games; , Pro Baseball Hall of Famer Randy Johnson did it in 252 games.

No. 1,900 for deGrom came on a a 91 mph slider to fan Seiya Suzuki.

Making the the the MLB itself was a dream fulfilled for deGrom, and he says he’s thankful for every moment he has in the big leagues.

“Every day I’m able to put this uniform on. I’m thankful for, this is what I grew up doing, and as a kid, it was only a dream to be able to play Major League Baseball, and to think that I might be able to accomplish really anything in this game was still just a dream,” said deGrom. “It’s always trying to get better and figure out ways to get people out, and there’s always adjustments to be made. And it’s just I’ve been very fortunate to be able to do this.”

deGrom didn’t allow a hit until Nico Hoerner’s double in the top of the fourth and would respond by retiring the next eight batters in a row till another Hoerner single.

Hoerner was the only Cubs batter to get a hit until Michael Busch singled in the seventh and final inning for deGrom, who finished the game giving up no runs off three hits with 10 strikeouts. Manager Skip Schumaker said that it might’ve been the three-time Cy Young Award winner’s best start of the season.

“That was what I remember when I faced him 10 years ago. I mean, it was on the attack, low pitch count, but high strikeout that’s so hard to do. That means you’re striking out guys, you know, four or five pitches every inning, 10 strikeouts…maybe one high leverage inning during the Nico lead off double. Other than that. I mean, he was huge, just on cruise control,” Schumaker said. “I mean that was as good as I’ve seen him this year. Maybe his best start so far.”

After a rough outing versus the New York Yankees, deGrom responded with his longest outing of the year and tied his season high for strikeouts while not allowing a single walk.

Can Bats build off Saturday?

The Rangers matched their season high for runs (6), hits (9) and home runs (2) in Saturday’s game and were hoping to build off a strong performance.

The Rangers had chances early with men in scoring positions in each of the first two innings, but went 0 for 2, one a Josh Jung double play in the first inning and the second a Justin Foscue fly out.

In the fourth inning they had men on second and third and only one out when Alejandro Osuna hit into a fielder’s choice, which scored Jung in a close play at home plate (which was unsuccessfully challenged by the Cubs.) .

Evan Carter ripped a two-run homer in the eighth-inning to give the Rangers a 3-0 lead heading into the ninth.

Schumaker complimented Carter’s, who’s hitting .176 with five home runs and 13 RBIs, at-bat.

“Evan had a couple weak fly balls to left field. Was frustrated, and then he gets a hanging slider against a guy that was throwing 100 miles an hour, and stays inside the ball, getting enough behind it for a home run. So yeah, excellent at bat. He’s been having good at bats. Just hasn’t had a ton of luck,” said Schumaker.

Josh Jung continues hot hitting

After getting off to slow start to the season Jung has been electric with his bat, hitting .381 in April and .324 in May.

Sunday he went 3 for 4 for the second straight game and Schumaker talked about how his performance helped set up the biggest hit of the night, Carter’s home run.

“Evan doesn’t have a chance to hit a homer if it wasn’t for [Jung] to get a base hit to the right side. Awesome that Evan got a home run, but again, it doesn’t happen without [Jung] fighting his tail off to get on base for that to happen,” said Schumaker.

Jung has been especially potent in his last four series at Globe Life Field hitting .373, and leads all Rangers in hits (22), home runs (3) and RBIs (10) in those series.

The Rangers (19-21) will be back in action against the Arizona Diamondbacks — a rematch of the 2023 World Series — at 7:05 p.m. on Monday at Globe Life Field.