Philadelphia ? Kevin Millwood eschewed baseball superstition, sought out hitting coach Greg Gross, sat down and talked about his swing.

No big deal?

This conversation took place while the Philadelphia Phillies were batting in the bottom of the eighth inning, and Millwood was just three outs away from pitching his first career no-hitter in a 1-0 victory Sunday over the San Francisco Giants.

“I kept trying to talk to him. I’d say stuff just to get him to talk to me,” Millwood said. “About the fifth inning, more and more guys don’t want to talk to you.”

Fearful of jinxing a pitcher who is flirting with a no-hitter, players, coaches and dugout personnel traditionally ignore the starter between innings. None of the Phillies were about to break the unwritten rule.

“It was really weird, because everybody knew but nobody was saying anything,” catcher Mike Lieberthal said. “It was utterly, dead quiet.”

Millwood wanted no part of the silence.

He walked over to Gross and told him he thought he missed two hittable pitches in his last at-bat, before flying out to center fielder Marquis Grissom.

Millwood then went out to the mound, retired pinch-hitters Neifi Perez and Marvin Benard on grounders, and got Grissom to fly out to center fielder Ricky Ledee to finish his gem.