If the Mets finish 11-11, the Phillies would need to go 14-8 (.636) to forge a first-place tie. It's not do-or-die, but it's certainly close.

"Everybody in here knows what's at stake," first baseman Ryan Howard said Wednesday, even before the Phillies lost a seventh-inning lead and dropped two of three games against the sad-sack Nationals to further decrease their wafer-thin margin of error.

Likewise, everybody remembers what happened last season. How can they forget?

Trailing the Mets by seven games with 17 remaining, the Phils swept a three-game series Sept. 15-17 at Shea, the beginning of their blazing 13-4 finish. Coupled with the Mets' 5-12 collapse, they were able to overtake New York on the season's final day to win their first NL East title since 1993.

And although it was a memorable triumph, it also was highly unlikely. The Phillies hardly can count on history repeating, and they insist they aren't.

"You try and take away what you can from last year," Howard said. "I think the past two years, we've been down by more than (three) games at this point. That's why, right now, everyone's kind of calm and reserved because we've been in worse positions. We know there's time. But you kind of have to have that urgency of trying to win some games."

Said manager Charlie Manuel, "I think we learned something by going through it last year, but I think we learned that winning something isn't easy. You've got to outplay people. That's what we've got to do again."