NEW YORK -- With Wednesday's win over the Padres, the Yankees have now won eight straight series. It's the first time they've done that since the 1998 season, when the team finished 114-48 and won the World Series (ironically enough, over the Padres).

Behind James Paxton's strong start, the Yankees offense -- which currently ranks fifth in baseball in runs -- scored seven times. Everything's clicking for the Yankees, who are still without most of their starters. But manager Aaron Boone hopes that when his star players return, the team won't lose any momentum and be able to grow stronger.

"I know we're getting really good players back," Boone said before the game. "Hopefully we're continuing to evolve and get better especially having younger players and guys that are in the prime of their career. Hopefully we don't stop getting better and more complete as hitters."

DJ LeMahieu got the first home run off Padres rookie pitcher Chris Paddack, and Luke Voit followed it up with one of his own. The last time the Yankees opened a game with back-to-back home runs was last July 7 at Toronto when Brett Gardner and Aaron Judge both homered off current Yankees pitcher J.A. Happ.

LeMahieu, who leads the Yankees in hits with 60, finished the game 1 for 3 with two walks and an RBI. "I was trying to jump on [Paddack] early, I guess that's always our approach. I had good at-bats against him the whole game."

"We have a lot of talent on this team," LeMahieu said. "But we're playing really good baseball too. It's been great."

The Yankees have gone 28-9 since April 19 -- the best record in MLB over that span -- the last time they dropped consecutive games was April 30-May 1 against the Arizona Diamondbacks. As of Wednesday afternoon, the Yankees hold a 1 1/2 game lead over the Tampa Bay Rays in the American League East.

They'll welcome the Boston Red Sox, who are in third place and seven games back, for a four-game series in the Bronx this weekend (fans can stream the games regionally via fuboTV). New York's stellar offense is ready to take on the reigning World Series champions.

"It's going to be a very good series for us," third baseman Gio Urshela said after the game. "We're gonna go in there tomorrow and fight."