MIAMI -- So where did the first baseball put in play by the Miami Marlins on Sunday travel?

Of course, it found Michael Conforto in his first professional start in center field.

Conforto proved up for the challenge, making a diving catch in right-center to snare Miguel Rojas’ liner.

The New York Mets ended up being up for the challenge overall in the rubber game of the meaningful series.

Behind six scoreless innings from Steven Matz, the Mets beat Miami, 3-0 Sunday at Marlins Park.

The Mets (52-45) moved back within a half-game of the Marlins (53-45) for the second wild-card spot.

“I didn’t have time to think -- just react,” Conforto said about his first-inning catch. “It kind of tells you that’s what you do in center. You just react. … Off the bat I felt like I got a good read on it and took off on a good angle. It started tailing a little bit toward the end. I ended up getting there. It was a lot of fun. It’s great to start off the game that way."

Matz (8-6) earned his first win since May 25. He allowed four hits and two walks and plunked one batter in a 99-pitch effort. He had been 0-3 with a 5.19 ERA in his past six starts.

“The fastball really had late life to it,” manager Terry Collins said. “You saw a lot of swings and misses on his fastball. I thought his changeup and his curveball he threw for strikes. He just came off in the sixth inning and told [pitching coach] Dan [Warthen] he was getting tired. And we know that can spell danger. So we got him out of there. But otherwise I thought he had a great game.”

Said Matz: “I think early on I was just really focused on staying within myself and letting my mechanics take over and not trying to muscle up. That’s something I’ve been kind of fighting against.”

Jeurys Familia matched Jose Valverde’s 2010-11 streak of 51 successful save conversions for the third-longest in MLB history. Eric Gagne converted an MLB-record 84 straight from 2002 through ’04, while Tom Gordon converted 54 straight in 1998 and ’99.

The Mets finished 5-4 on their second-half-opening trip to Philadelphia, Chicago and Miami.

“I said after the break, this was crunch time for us,” Collins said. “We knew coming in we had the Cubs, we had the Marlins, who were playing good. We had to come in and catch up. We couldn’t lose any more ground. We’ve got to hang in there until we start to get healthy or we start to really get clicking offensively. So this was a good series for us to win.”

In addition to his fielding gem, Conforto went 2-for-2 at the plate on the one-year anniversary of his major league debut. He scored the game’s opening run on Jose Reyes’ two-out triple in the third against Jose Urena.

When the Marlins inserted left-hander Mike Dunn in the seventh, Collins had Juan Lagares pinch hit for Conforto.

Collins had noted pregame that he intends to use Lagares as a defensive replacement for Conforto late in games in which the Mets have a narrow lead, so Dunn’s entry with the score 1-0 proved an opportune time.

Yoenis Cespedes and James Loney had consecutive RBI singles against Kyle Barraclough in the eighth to open a three-run lead.

Conforto is being pressed into center field duty because a balky right quadriceps has prompted the Mets to limit Cespedes to left field.

Collins prefers not to use 35-year-old Curtis Granderson in center field at this stage of his career, which leaves Conforto forced to learn the position on the fly in order to get his bat in the lineup.

Conforto is now 5-for-11 in five games (three starts) since returning from a three-week demotion to Triple-A Las Vegas that had been designed to repair his swing and restore his confidence. He indicated that a key is not trying to pull the ball, which helps guard against his front shoulder flying open.

“Just getting back to the kind of hitter that I feel like I am and use the whole field, take what the pitcher gives me,” Conforto said. “It’s really stuff we were working on up there. When you go down there, you get a chance to take a breath and really look at what’s going on and work on some things. It was a positive for me to go down there and work on some stuff.”

Oh-fer: Asdrubal Cabrera grounded into a fielder’s choice with the bases loaded in the eighth. That dropped Cabrera to 0-for-his-last-32 with runners in scoring position. Cabrera is five hitless RISP at-bats away from matching the franchise record shared by Greg Jefferies (1990) and Tom Seaver (1971-73).

What’s next: The Mets return home to face the St. Louis Cardinals. Noah Syndergaard (9-4, 2.43 ERA) opposes right-hander Carlos Martinez (9-6, 2.83) in Monday’s 7:10 p.m. ET opener.