No. 22 Auburn picked up a 2-1 series win over Old Dominion at Plainsman Park, improving to 13-3 on the season.
The Tigers picked up a 10-4 win on Friday, dropped the Saturday game 11-9 and clinched the series with a 7-3 win in the rubber match on Sunday.
Here’s a recap of the Tigers’ weekend:
Game one
Paired with a strong performance from the backend of the bullpen, Auburn lit up the scoreboard in four of the five middle innings to take the series opener 10-4 over Old Dominion on Friday night at Plainsman Park.
Deric Fabian and Chase Fralick accounted for five of Auburn’s 12 hits and drove in seven of its 10 runs, while the duo of John Armstrong and Ryan Hetzler allowed just one runner in the final 3.2 innings.
“John Armstrong has his sinker going. He hadn’t pitched in a week or so and was phenomenal,” head coach Butch Thompson said. “Ryan Hetzler has been great every time we’ve called on him early this season. We got three goose eggs in the seventh, eighth and ninth.
“We did a great job of playing offense when we took what they gave us,” he added. “We had a bunch of baserunners, we set the table, and we waited for the big swing. Chase Fralick got it.”
With Auburn holding a 7-4 lead in a two-out, bases loaded situation in the seventh inning, Chase Fralick hit a bases-clearing opposite field double to extend the Tigers’ lead to six. It was Fralick’s sixth multi-hit game in the last eight contests, and he drove in a season-high four runs.
With one and a Monarch runner in scoring positions Armstrong entered in the sixth to retire eight of the nine batters he faced to secure his first win of the season.
Old Dominion struck first with a solo-homer from the second batter of the game, and Auburn was unable to answer in the home half of the inning. The ensuing inning, Auburn opened with two singles and tied the game on an Ike Irish groundout. Fabian followed with a single up the middle to give the Tigers the lead, and Fralick extended his hitting streak to 10 games with a line drive to center field.
Sam Dutton, who got the start for the Tigers, faced the minimum in the third and fourth innings, and Auburn extended its lead with two runs in the bottom half with Eric Snow and Chris Rembert doing the damage.
Old Dominion cut into its deficit with a two-out double in the fifth and made it a one-run game with a two-run single in the sixth. Fabian extended Auburn’s lead back to two with a solo-homer in the bottom of the sixth. He recorded his third hit of the game in the seventh to score Snow. Cade Belyeu singled and Rembert walked to load the bases for Fralick’s bases-clearing double to cap the scoring efforts.
Hetzler struck out the first two batters he faced in a clean ninth inning, marking the fourth game he has finished this season.
Game two
With Auburn leading by seven through six innings, Old Dominion scored nine unanswered runs in the seventh and eighth innings to secure an 11- 9 win and even the series on Saturday at Plainsman Park.
“We threw guys that we count on to win a series tonight, and it felt like nobody got comfortable on the mound the longer it went,” Thompson said. “It’s really strange, too, because you strike out 15 batters. You have 15 strikeouts, but they definitely put the bat on the ball, hit some balls hard. I don’t know what to call this but past us. That was disappointing on the mound tonight for sure.”
Old Dominion took an early 1-0 lead with a run in the second inning, but Auburn responded in the bottom half of the inning as Rembert and Irish traded two-out doubles to even things up.
The Tigers took a 4-1 lead with a three-run inning in the third. Fabian drove in his 19th RBI of the season with a bases-loaded groundout to second and Belyeu followed with a two-run single to center.
The Monarchs added a run in the fourth on an RBI fielder’s choice, but Auburn responded with five runs in the home half. Eric Snow cleared the bases with a two-run double to the gap in left center field and Cooper McMurray hammered the next pitch 406 feet over the wall in right-center field. The inning continued with back-to-back singles from Fabian and Belyeu before Irish drew a bases-loaded walk with two outs to make it a 9-2 game.
Cam Tilly turned in three innings out of the bullpen, giving up one run, to make way for Dylan Watts in the sixth. Watts gave up a leadoff double but retired the next three batters with two strikeouts.
Old Dominion scored five runs in the top of the seventh with the big blow coming on a two-out, bases-clearing double. The Monarchs continued to chip away with a two-out run in the eighth to cut the deficit to one before taking the lead on a three-run home run.
Auburn threatened with a bases loaded situation in the eighth, but were unable to capitalize and followed with a 1-2-3 inning in the bottom of the ninth.
“Definitely a tough one to lose,” Snow said. “Series are three games, though, and that’s really what we have to think about. We have to come back out tomorrow with a different mindset and kind of forget about this one.”
Game three
Auburn bounced back with a 7-3 win on Sunday to clinch the series over Old Dominion at Plainsman Park.
The Monarchs were held hitless until the fourth inning as the duo of Christian Chatterton and Carson Myers combined for 10 strikeouts on the day. Meanwhile, the Tigers tallied 13 hits with two home runs and seven RBIs.
Bouncing back from Saturday’s letdown after being up seven runs, Auburn struck first and scored in all but three innings as it never relinquished its lead. A no-doubt two-run shot over the wall in right field from McMurray in the eighth inning capped off the Tigers’ scoring efforts.
Myers gave up two hits and as many runs as the Monarchs turned in a two-run blast in their last at-bat, but Myers retired three straight after the homer to end it. Their only other run came unearned in the sixth on a sacrifice fly to left field.
With runners on the corners, Rembert singled to shortstop to put the Tigers on the board. An inning later, Fabian blasted one to deep left center field that, after review, was a homer-turned double, ultimately scoring Snow from first. Again in the fourth, Snow singled up the middle to score Bub Terrell from second to give the Tigers a 3-0 cushion.
In the fifth, Fabian left no doubts as he blasted a home run over the War Eagle Wall in left field to lead off the inning. Belyeu reached on an error from the Monarchs’ first baseman and advanced to second and Fralick singled to left center field to score Belyeu.
Chatterton recorded his second win of the season, going 5.2 innings with three hits allowed, one run scored and six strikeouts. Heading into the ninth, Myers had worked just one hit as he recorded the save in the final 3.1 innings.
Auburn will travel to Madison to take on UT Martin at Toyota Field on Tuesday. First pitch is set for 6 p.m.
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