MINNEAPOLIS (Ticker) -- The Minnesota Twins capitalized on the comforts of home and put the Oakland Athletics in a familiar position.

Eric Milton allowed two runs in seven innings and the Twins took advantage of a string of miscues to score seven times in the fourth and rout the A's, 11-2, forcing a decisive fifth game in their American League Division Series.

After losing in the Metrodome for just the second time in 13 postseason games, the Twins bounced back with a huge effort, erasing an early deficit and breaking open a tight contest by scoring seven unearned runs in the fourth.

The game drew a Metrodome-record 55,960, and many fans stayed on their feet from the start.

"I think it was big," Twins first baseman Doug Mientkiewicz said of the crowd. "They were really in the game early. They were screaming, `Let's go, Twins' before Milton even threw a pitch. They are great. It was a heck of an atmosphere."

"That one inning was what it is all about," Hunter said. "The fans were cheering even when we were up nine runs. They are great. We needed that."

By staving off elimination, the Twins earned the right to head back to Oakland. The heavily favored Athletics face a Game Five in the Division Series for the third straight year. Oakland lost both of those previous contests and is 3-9 in its last 12 postseason home games.

Game Five is Sunday, with the A's sending Game Two winner Mark Mulder against Brad Radke, who won Game One.

Oakland, which was able to withstand the indoor uproar in Game Three, took an early lead in this one as Miguel Tejada ripped a two-run homer off Milton (1-0) in the third.

But the Twins tied it in the bottom of the inning on a run-scoring groundout by Cristian Guzman and a ground-rules double by David Ortiz.

Mientkiewicz opened the fourth with a single and A.J. Pierzynski walked one out later. Luis Rivas bounced a chopper in the hole between shortstop and third base. Tejada fielded the ball and tossed to third, but his throw was high and wide, allowing Mientkiewicz to score.

"I have no excuse for that," Tejada said. "I threw a little off-balance because I thought that was the only chance I had for making a play. It wasn't too close or anything, I just threw it badly."

Unnerved, Hudson (0-2) uncorked a wild pitch that plated Pierzynski, then hit Jacque Jones. Oakland manager Art Howe brought the infield in and the strategy appeared to work when first baseman Scott Hatteberg fielded a bouncer in front of the bag. But his throw to the plate short-hopped Ramon Hernandez and Rivas scored for a 5-2 lead.

"I was going to come home with it, but I stuttered my feet and made a bad throw," Hatteberg said. "The whole inning was a lot of bad timing."

With the crowd in a frenzy, Howe went to Ted Lilly, but Corey Koskie greeted the lefthander with a base hit up the middle that scored Jones. David Ortiz struck out, but Lilly fired wild to the plate, scoring Guzman, and Hunter made it 8-2 with a double to the left-center field gap.

Mientkiewicz capped the biggest inning in Division Series history with an RBI single - his second hit in the frame. The last player with two hits in an inning in the postseason was Chuck Knoblauch, who accomplished the feat for the New York Yankees in the 2000 Division Series.

"I think everybody picked each other up," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "We had some big two-out base hits, so it kind of got the ball rolling, and once that thing starts rolling, everybody wants to get involved in it."

"We just made a couple throwing errors in the same inning, and that kind of opened the door," Howe said.

Oakland could do little to stem the tide.

"They strung a lot of hits together after that and broke the game wide-open. But Hudson pitched a lot better than the way it looked," Howe said. "He should have been out of that inning with no runs being scored, but that's baseball."

"The fourth inning was one of those deals that snowballs on you," Hudson added. "I battled early in the inning, but they put pressure on us and we couldn't make plays."

Staked to the huge lead, Milton cruised. The 27-year-old lefthander allowed six hits and a walk. He struck out three and threw 75 of 108 pitches for strikes in his first postseason start.

Milton retired seven straight batters between the fourth and sixth innings. He allowed more than one runner in an inning just twice.

"I felt pretty good and I made one mistake," Milton said. "But when your guys come back and tie the score, it's easy to forget about that. ... It's nice to see the guys hitting and running around the bases. So I try to stay loose. And when you get out there, you have to calm yourself down, the next inning you have to be ready for the next hitter. And that's what I did."

"The real story of the day was Milton, I thought. Milton did what we needed to have done," Gardenhire said. "He shut them down and gave us a chance to have a big inning, and it was a great performance."

Kyle Lohse allowed a hit over the final two innings. He has tossed four scoreless frames in the series, striking out five.

Hudson, who allowed four runs and eight hits in 5 1/3 innings on Tuesday, was worse in Game Four. The talented righthander surrendered seven runs - just two earned - and five hits in 3 1/3 innings.

"We knew it wouldn't be easy today," Hudson said. "Milton is tough and their team took advantage of our miscues. After that fourth inning, it was going to be tough for us to rebound. Our guys make those plays with their eyes closed most of the time. Things just happened today."

Lilly yielded four runs and seven hits in 3 1/3 innings.

Oakland's Jermaine Dye went 3-for-3 and is 7-for-16 in the series.

The 11 runs tied the Twins' postseason high, set against St. Louis in Game Six of the 1987 World Series.