(Best E Casino) - The Arizona Diamondbacks will attempt to conclude what's been a successful homestand thus far on another positive note, as the National League West front-runners aim for a second straight win over the Florida Marlins this afternoon.

Arizona was able to pad its lead atop the division to three games over second- place Los Angeles with Saturday's 7-1 triumph over the Marlins, the Diamondbacks' ninth victory in their last 12 contests. The Dodgers were beaten by Philadelphia for a second straight time yesterday afternoon.

Former Marlin Yusmeiro Petit (3-3) limited his old club to one run on two hits over the first six innings to lead the way on Saturday. The young right-hander got offensive help from Chris Young and Miguel Montero, each of whom homered and finished with two hits.

Arizona reached Florida rookie Chris Volstad (4-3) for four runs and seven hits over 5 1/3 innings to hand the highly-touted young pitcher his first loss since August 1.

Marlins star shortstop Hanley Ramirez, who had missed the team's last two games with a bruised right thumb, returned to the lineup last night and had a solo home run among his four at-bats.

Saturday's loss was Florida's 10th in its last 15 games. The slide has dropped the Marlins into third place in the NL East standings and six games behind the division-leading New York Mets.

Florida will try for a rebound today behind its best starting pitcher this season, Ricky Nolasco. The right-hander tops the Marlins with 12 wins for the year to go along with a very solid 3.67 earned run average over 27 games (25 starts).

Nolasco was on top of his game in Tuesday's outing at San Francisco, firing a complete-game two-hitter with 11 strikeouts to register his first career shutout. The dominating performance improved the 25-year-old to 7-3 in 14 road starts this season.

He's also been quite successful when facing the Diamondbacks during his three major league seasons. Nolasco has won all three of his career starts against Arizona and allowed just five runs and 15 hits in 22 1/3 innings over the course of those games.

Two of those victories came earlier this year, with Nolasco surrendering just two runs and racking up 16 strikeouts over a span of 15 innings.

Arizona concludes a six-game homestand today and has gone 4-1 so far on the residency. The team will hand the ball in the finale to veteran Doug Davis, who's coming off a solid showing in his last start.

Against San Diego on Tuesday, Davis gave up just two runs over six innings to pick up his fifth win of the season. It was only the left-hander's second victory since June 30, with the other one also coming at the expense of the lowly Padres.

Davis has yet to face the Marlins this year, but owns a 2-1 record with a 4.55 ERA in five previous starts against Florida.

The Marlins have won five of their seven 2008 meetings with Arizona, but were swept in four games by the Diamondbacks in their lone visit to Chase Field last season.