HOUSTON -- With Brandon Backe's 6 2/3-inning, two-run performance in a 3-2 win over the Reds, manager Cecil Cooper hopes the Backe he saw Thursday is the one he will have the rest of the season.

Backe had thrown 64 pitches through six innings, shutting out Cincinnati on three hits before allowing two runs in the seventh.

"He attacked the zone with his fastball, then he went to his offspeed stuff when he needed to," Cooper said. "That's the kind of guy I like to see out there."

Backe has won his past two games in an up-and-down season in which he has shown inconsistency, following one brilliant start with a clunker for most of the year.

But Cooper said the key to the right-hander's success is pounding the strike zone, something the manager has preached since Spring Training. Cooper has been trying to get Backe to trust his pitches all season.

"I try to pound the strike zone every time, but sometimes it's not that easy for whatever reason -- mechanically, mentally," Backe said. "It's easy to say but not necessarily easy to do. Pounding the strike zone, that's not necessarily the key to winning. It's changing speeds, being consistent in the zone but being good in the zone."

Backe thought with the low pitch count that he would be able to make it to the eighth inning or possibly throw a complete game. But he began to unravel in the seventh, starting with a bunt by Brandon Phillips.

The ball dropped between third base and home, and Backe, sliding to make the play, couldn't pick it up.

A triple to left-center field by Jay Bruce got stuck on the side of the Crawford Boxes, scoring Phillips, and Backe walked Adam Rosales in the next at-bat. Cooper visited the mound before Backe gave up an RBI single to Corey Patterson.

"To get two outs and then have all [that] happen," he said, "I kind of put it upon myself, but the score kind of dictated why I threw the pitches that I did. I'm just more frustrated that I didn't last longer than 6 2/3. But it was obvious that I needed to come out of there, because they were starting to roll."

Cooper said he knew Backe did not want to leave the game, but he had Wesley Wright and Doug Brocail ready to pitch. Brocail finished the inning by forcing Ryan Hanigan to ground into a fielder's choice at second base.

For the second consecutive game, the Astros' long balls kept them just ahead. Ty Wigginton had his first multiple-homer game of the season and the seventh of his career.

He hit his first, to left field, in the second at-bat of the first inning on a 2-0 count, and the second shot led off the sixth, just over the fence in left-center field.

"Seems like every time he goes to left, he does something like that," Cooper said of Wigginton. "I guess we'll have to just leave him out there. For the last couple of months, he's been about as hot as Carlos Lee was before he left, so we're going to keep running him out there."

Wigginton, who has 10 of the Astros' Major League-leading 40 homers in August, maintains that he has not changed anything about his approach and said he feels exactly the same as he did at the beginning of the season.

"If there is a difference, it's that early on in the season I felt good, but when I busted up my thumb a little bit, it took a little bit when I came back to get timing," he said. "Since about the middle or end of May, that's when I started getting comfortable at the plate."

Humberto Quintero took Aaron Harang deep for his second blast of the season in the fifth inning, a ball off the foul pole Chick-fil-A Cow high in left field.

Both of Quintero's home runs this season have been against Cincinnati.

"I went back and looked at [the home run]," said Harang. "I don't know how he kept that ball fair. It was on the chalk, inside on him. I wasn't expecting that, especially after a first-pitch bunt attempt."

Quintero also picked off Chris Dickerson at first base from behind the plate to end the sixth inning. As often as Quintero has tried that play, Thursday was the first time it has worked, and his teammates all congratulated him for it.

"Brad [Ausmus] is happy," Quintero said. "He said, 'Hey, you throw 100 times, you'll get one!' It's a good situation with two outs and a guy on first, and I threw him out to get Backe out of the inning."

With the victory, the Astros have won all four series against the Reds this season, with a 10-2 record against them, including a four-game sweep from Aug. 7-10.

Houston has won 14 of its past 16 against Cincinnati since May 31, 2007.

"Things are falling in line, I guess," Backe said. "I don't know. I'm throwing the ball well, but there's been a lot of games this year where I've thought I've thrown the ball well and come up empty. [It was] just overall a good day for all of us, and I guess I started it by throwing the ball toward the plate."