St. Louis ? The St. Louis Cardinals found a way to rally past the Kansas City Royals despite losing Albert Pujols to an injury.

Pujols sprained his left wrist and hurt his shoulder trying to make a tag at first base, but the Cardinals recovered to beat the Royals 5-4 on Skip Schumaker’s ninth-inning homer on Sunday.

The Cardinals moved into a tie for first place in the NL Central with Milwaukee, which lost at Boston.

Pujols was injured in the sixth and the three-time NL MVP left the game. He will be evaluated on Monday, a day off for St. Louis.

Manager Tony La Russa said he experienced a range of emotions when he saw his first baseman go down.

“It scared the hell out of all of us,” La Russa said. “It smoked him pretty good. The doctor said he has good strength so that makes us kind of optimistic. First indications are that we caught a break.”

Pujols, hitting .279, was 3-for-3 with his 17th home run. The fifth-inning shot gave St. Louis a 3-2 lead.

Lance Berkman, who had been given a rest Sunday, replaced Pujols at first.

Leading off the ninth, Alcides Escobar hit his first home run on a 3-2 pitch from St. Louis reliever Fernando Salas, who threw 10 pitches in the at-bat. It was Escobar’s first homer in 325 at-bats and it tied the game at 4. It marked just the second blown save in 15 attempts for Salas (4-1).

After leadoff hitter Dan Descalso got thrown out trying to stretch a single, Schumaker connected off Tim Collins (3-4), the fifth Royals pitcher.

It was Schumaker’s second game-ending homer, the first coming in 2008, and his first home run since April 13.

“I’m not sure there’s a better feeling than hitting a home run walk off,” Schumaker said. “It doesn’t happen too often, home runs in general, so I’ll take it.”

It was also Schumaker’s first major-league home run off a left-hander.

“I was disappointed I was out of the game and I didn’t get to punch Schumaker in the ribs after the walk-off,” Pujols said.

Schumaker hit Collins’ second pitch.

“He was obviously sitting fastball,” Collins said. “He got it and he hit it. It might have been a little bit over the plate. I was trying to get back into the count.”