In front of the fourth-largest crowd in Auburn softball history, the fifth-ranked Tigers downed No. 21 Ole Miss in dreary fashion, 3-1 on Friday night at Jane B. Moore Field.
The 2,305 on hand for game one between the Tigers and Rebels saw Auburn pitcher Kaylee Carlson pitch all seven innings, allowing six hits and only one run. Carlson launched seven strikeouts, falling one short of tying her season-high of eight.
“It flew by,” Carlson said. The fast-paced contest saw no walks and was over in just an hour and 41 minutes.
The Rebels’ Elantra Cox kicked off the scoring, when a sacrifice-fly rang home the first run of the night in the top of the third. Cox, along with shortstop Paige McKinney, finished 2 for 3 at the plate to pace the Ole Miss offense. Past the third inning tally, the Rebels had no answer for Carlson and the Auburn defense. All six of the Ole Miss hits were of the infield variety.
Kasey Cooper & Co. weathered offensive struggles of their own early in the ballgame, as the Rebels’ Kaitlin Lee pitched a shutout until the fourth inning. Prior to the fourth stanza detonation, spearheaded by Cooper, the Tigers couldn’t get the hits to leave the infield, resulting in easy ground-outs and multiple three up, three down sequences.
“It wasn’t pretty,” Auburn head coach Clint Myers said. “Great teams figure out ways to win and that’s the bottom line. She [Lee] was deceptive. We just weren’t disciplined.”
The Cooper heroics in the fourth included a line-drive double to the wall for Auburn’s second hit. Haley Fagan followed up at the dish with a perfectly placed bunt to put runners on the corners with no outs. Kendall Veach brought home Cooper with a single to tie the game at one.
Rising freshman Alyssa Rivera then blooped a two-run single into left, which served as the go-ahead score, placing the Tigers on top, 3-1.
Rivera is coming off a phenomenal performance in the series sweep over Georgia, continuing her ascendancy with a 2 for 3 clip at the plate and the pair of go-ahead RBIs.
“I’m trying to figure out her style,” Myers said. “She’s a heck of an athlete. When she figures it out, she really could be dangerous, because she has high upside. She’s a young lady that can hit the ball in a corner and then lay down a bunt. She’s trying to figure out who she is too. As long as she keeps putting the ball in play, I’m a happy camper.”
Cooper, who turned 22 on Friday, recovered nicely from a rough trip to Athens by also finishing 2 for 3. An inning after her monster double, the senior roped a single down the right-field line. Although a bizarre ruling regarding an out at first base ended the inning, Cooper still felt content with her performance, calling the pair of hits, “a breath of fresh air.” Cooper was also asked about the infamous status of Alyssa Rivera.
“I see so much potential,” Cooper said. “I see a kid just wanting to have fun. It looks like she just enjoys playing the game. When she sees a ball, she reacts. When she’s up at the plate, everybody wants her there.”
Veach highlighted the late defensive efforts with an impressive leaping grab at first base in the top of the sixth. Following Rivera’s single, Carlson (19-1) began to dominate, retiring nine straight batters after taking the lead.
“I felt a lot better, the infield hits don’t matter as much when we have runs on the board,” Carlson said. “I’ve been trying to trust [the changeup] more and not think about it as much. I’m going back to when it was effortless, like last year. It’s been working so far.”
Carlson’s seven strikeouts are her most in the last week and a half, a time span full of distractions for the pitching staff following the sudden resignation of Corey Myers. Since Myers left the program, the squad is 4-0.
“I think it’s been a big adjustment,” Carlson said. “Hunter [Veach] has stepped up a lot and [Clint Myers] has helped too. We have to trust in ourselves and our preparation, because Corey prepared us for the rest of the season. We know what we need to do and we know our plan.”
The loss for Ole Miss drops the visitors from Oxford, Mississippi to 2-8 in the conference and 25-12 overall. The Tigers have reeled off five straight SEC wins, improving their 2017 tally to 32-5, 7-3 SEC. The teams will meet again for game two of the Top 25 tilt Saturday at 3 p.m. CST.
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