(Sports Network) - The owners of baseball's top record this season will clash with the team that's played the best over the past month when the Los Angeles Dodgers host the Colorado Rockies tonight in the opener of a key three-game series between National League West foes.

The Rockies enter Dodger Stadium with wins in 20 of their past 23 contests and have closed within 7 1/2 games of Los Angeles' lead atop the division. Since Jim Tracy replaced Clint Hurdle as the team's manager on May 29, Colorado has recorded a sensational 22-7 record.

Colorado has yet to face the Dodgers with Tracy behind the bench, but the club had all sorts of problems against them under Hurdle's watch. Los Angeles has won eight of nine meetings between the teams this year and swept a three-game set at Dodger Stadium from April 17-19.

The Dodgers also swept a three-game series from the Rockies in Denver from May 25-27 and outscored Colorado by a 31-13 margin in those games, which happened to be the last three with Hurdle as the manager.

Colorado heads in off three straight road victories over the Oakland Athletics, including a 3-1 decision in Sunday's finale.

Aaron Cook (8-3) took a shutout into the ninth inning for the Rockies and yielded just one run on nine hits over eight-plus frames. The sinker specialist has allowed just seven runs over his last five outings and produced a 1.75 earned run average in that time period.

"The starting pitching leads the way through everything," said Rockies closer Huston Street, one of three players traded by the A's to Colorado in the offseason deal involving outfielder Matt Holliday. "The boys put up 11 runs yesterday, which proved to be necessary, and we're just kind of rolling that way. We're getting 11 when they score nine, and we're scoring three and only giving up one. That's what good teams do -- good teams find a way to win."

Carlos Gonzalez, also part of the Holliday trade, finished 2-for-2 with an RBI double and a pair of walks for Colorado.

While the Dodgers still hold a seven-game advantage over second-place San Francisco in the NL West race, they've dropped four of their past five games and are coming off back-to-back home defeats to Seattle. Los Angeles mustered only three runs in the two losses and had only five hits in Sunday's 4-2 setback to the Mariners.

Matt Kemp hit a solo homer for Los Angeles and Andre Ethier drove in the team's other run with a sacrifice fly. Starting pitcher Hiroki Kuroda (2-4) worked 6 1/3 innings but was reached for four runs on eight hits to take the loss.

The Dodgers hope to get a sharper outing tonight out of Randy Wolf, while the veteran lefty will be vying to stop a five-start winless stretch when he takes the mound for the home team.

Wolf is 0-2 with a 5.74 ERA since besting the Chicago Cubs on May 28 and had his shortest outing of the season on Wednesday, when he surrendered five runs and three homers before being lifted after 3 1/3 innings in a loss to the Chicago White Sox.

The 32-year-old is 4-2 with a 4.50 ERA over 10 career starts against Colorado. Wolf faced the Rockies at Dodger Stadium on April 17 and got a no-decision after allowing three runs over six innings, although he did record a season- best nine strikeouts.

Ubaldo Jimenez gets the call for Colorado and will be encountering the Dodgers for the fourth time in 2009. The talented right-hander has lost in each of the first three meetings and given up a whopping 18 runs (17 earned) and 24 hits over 15 innings of work.

Jimenez started at Dodger Stadium on April 19 and was toasted for seven runs over 4 1/3 innings of his team's 14-2 loss. He is 4-3 with a 6.84 ERA in 10 overall appearances (9 starts) versus Los Angeles.

While he's had his share of troubles against the Dodgers, the 25-year-old fared quite well against the rest of the league recently. Jimenez won three straight starts between June 7-18 before dropping a decision against the Angels on Tuesday, a game in which he surrendered four runs over seven innings.