LATE LEAD STICKS FOR ANGELS : ANGELS 5, BOSTON 4.

Byline: Daily News Wire Services

The Angels are beginning to make a habit of blowing leads.

Tuesday, they screwed up three before doing what they've done in most of their victories this season - scoring the winning run in their final at bat for a 5-4 victory over the Boston Red Sox.

``This is the way this team has played the whole time from day one,'' Angels manager Terry Collins said. ``We've gotten the big hit when we've needed it.''

Garrett Anderson got it this time, hitting another single in a season in which his power has pooped out but his batting average is .340. Before this season, 28 percent of his hits went for extra bases. This year, 31 of his 33 hits are singles.

He didn't mind, though, when he singled in the go-ahead run off Butch Henry (1-1) in the ninth. Of the Angels 12 wins, seven have come in their final inning and they've come from behind in eight of them.

``As long as I keep getting singles, that's fine with me,'' said Anderson, who had fallen behind in the count 0-2 before driving home Jim Leyritz. Tim Salmon, who was intentionally walked, was tagged out between third and home.

But Boston couldn't rally in the bottom of the ninth against Mike James, who got his second save despite giving up a leadoff single to Tim Naehring, who walked in his other four at-bats. Mike Holtz (2-0) got the win.

The Red Sox squandered numerous opportunities, getting four men thrown out on the basepaths in the first four innings and leaving the bases loaded in the sixth, seventh and eighth.

``We had some opportunities to win the game. We just didn't pull it through,'' Mo Vaughn said.

Anaheim led 1-0, 3-2 and 4-3 and had a chance to go ahead in the eighth after Boston tied it 4-4. But left fielder Wilfredo Cordero threw out pinch runner Craig Grebeck at the plate after Orlando Palmeiro's grounder got by third baseman Naehring for an error.

``One play doesn't make a game, but it gave us a little momentum,'' Cordero said.

Boston tied it in the seventh on a bases-loaded walk to Naehring. The Angels had gone ahead in the top of the inning when Palmeiro scored on Leyritz's bases-loaded groundout to shortstop.

Notes: The Angels' Gary DiSarcina went 0 for 4 and is in a 5-for-54 slump. . . Langston has allowed three earned runs or fewer in four of his six starts. . . . The Angels two saves are the fewest in the majors.