Avery Is Braves’ Edge : Baseball: He no-hits Astros for 6 2/3 innings in a 5-2 victory that makes Atlanta the leader in the National League West.

Steve Avery, who has proved to be unbeatable for the Dodgers, almost proved to be unhittable for the Houston Astros Friday night.

Adding drama to a National League West Division race that has hardly been without it, the 21-year-old left-hander pitched a no-hitter for 6 2/3 innings of a 5-2 victory that enabled the Atlanta Braves to take a one-game lead over the Dodgers with two games to play.

If the San Francisco Giants beat the Dodgers again, the last-to-first Braves could clinch the National League West championship today, when John Smoltz (13-13) faces Mark Portugal (10-11).

Pressure?

“There’s none,” said Avery, three years out of high school. “The people up there tomahawking, they’re the ones who are nervous. We’re just going about our jobs.”

A crowd of 45,815, delivering war whoops and waving rubber tomahawks, saw Avery improve to 18-8 in his second year in the major leagues and further antagonize the Dodgers, against whom he is 5-0 for his career and 3-0 this year.

“He shouldn’t even be at this level, but he is,” catcher Greg Olson said of Avery. “At 21, he’s incredible.”

Avery picked the opener of this trans-continental division showdown on the final weekend of the regular season to pitch what he called his best game.

He retired 18 batters in order at one point, lost his no-hitter on a double by Luis Gonzalez in the seventh inning and turned it over to Alejandro Pena after Ken Caminiti opened the ninth with a home run, the third of Houston’s four hits.

Said Avery: “I started to think about the no-hitter in the fourth inning, which is much too early to try and pitch five more with that on your mind.”

Pena has converted all 11 of his save opportunities since joining the Braves on Aug. 29, but this was Avery’s show.

With the time difference, was he trying to send the Dodgers a message?

“No,” he said with a smile. “I think they’ve got enough pressure on them already.

“I just wanted to pitch a good game. I guess that sent them a message.”

The Braves have delivered it in other forms as well, winning seven in a row to improve their record since the All-Star break to 54-27, the best in baseball. They are 26 games over .500 for the first time in their history and have tied their franchise record with 93 victories.

“Right now, we’re the best team,” Avery said. “We’re in the driver’s seat if the Dodgers lose tonight. Two more like this and we’ll win it.”

Most of the Braves had left by the time the Dodgers began play in San Francisco Friday night, but Will Clark’s first inning home run brought shouts of “yeah, baby,” from the few watching in the players’ lounge.

“All we have to do is win,” said David Justice, Atlanta’s right fielder. “I don’t see how the Dodgers can win three straight in San Francisco.”

There is some question if Houston can win even one here.

Precariously carrying the Los Angeles hopes, the last-place Astros made four errors, directly leading to three runs.

Rookie shortstop Andujar Cedeno, imitating the recent play of the Dodgers’ Jose Offerman, made three errors, undermining rookie pitcher Jeff Juden.

Juden, in his third big league start, went five innings, giving up four runs. Terry Pendleton hit a solo homer, and Ron Gant set up three of the four runs with a single and double. Two errors by Cedeno in the second inning and a wild pickoff by Juden in the third were costly.

“I think the whole country is rooting for the Braves to win, but we came here knowing we had a job to do,” Houston catcher Craig Biggio said. “The next best thing to winning would be to prevent Atlanta from winning, but this was a little embarrassing.”

Houston Manager Art Howe had held a pregame meeting to remind his young team--18 of the 31 Astros are rookies--that their integrity would be on the line as the nation watched this weekend.

He told them to relax and “try to take something positive out of what has been a long season.”

On the night that it became a little longer, veteran Jim Deshaies, who will be leaving the Astros as a free agent, reflected on the hate campaign that the Dodgers have been experiencing and said:

“It’s always fashionable to hate a team that wins a lot, but it’s really just envy--their success, the media attention, (Manager Tom) Lasorda’s Dodger blue, the Hollywood image, Tony Danza in the dugout.

“No one hates the Dodger players. It’s the whole picture--and you can bet Lasorda is feeding off this, using it, telling his players the whole league is rooting against them.”

Not the Astros, however. “Heck, what do these kids know?” Deshaies said. “They haven’t been here long enough to hate anyone.”