Backed with strong pitching, the No. 22 Florida Gators took a chomp out of Auburn's baseball team this weekend, winning the three-game series, 2-1.
Auburn (23-12, 7-8 SEC) won the first game, 8-7. Then Florida (23-12, 9-6 SEC) took Saturday's game, 24-2, and Sunday's game, 5-1.
"We kept the game close, but I thought the difference in the second game yesterday and then today was the offense," said Auburn head coach John Pawlowski. "They pitched extremely well, and we didn't have any quality at-bats."
Auburn's Taylor Thompson (2-2) took the loss in the rubber game while Florida's Anthony DeSclafani earned his fourth win of the season. Auburn's pitching staff walked 11 total batters.
"(DeSclafani) is really good, we had a hard time getting anything going against him," said sophomore Justin Hargett.
In the second and third games, Auburn's bats were unusually quiet. Sunday marked the first time Auburn went back-to-back games without hitting a single home run in more than a year.
"We can't hit home runs all the time," Hargett said. "We're not always going to be hot, so sometimes we have to rely on the small game."
Matt den Dekker's RBI in the second put Florida up 1-0, and Auburn tied the game in the third when Hargett scored off Joseph Sanders' sacrifice fly.
Florida scored twice in the fourth and then twice in the eighth to get the 5-1 win.
In game two, the Gators led 3-2 after five innings, then Auburn self-destructed in the sixth.
Florida scored seven runs in the sixth, nine runs in the seventh and five in the ninth to bring the final score to 24-2.
Sanders and Ben Jones had Auburn's only RBIs in the third and fifth, respectively. Auburn's Jon Luke Jacobs (3-2) took the loss.
Friday's game was suspended in the top of the fifth inning due to weather, with Auburn down 4-1.
When the game was resumed, Florida went up 7-1 after the top of the sixth.
Auburn scored three runs in the sixth, followed by two runs in the eighth and one in the ninth.
Sanders hit his second homer of the game, and Fletcher then hit a two-run homer to put the game at 7-4 in the sixth.
With two outs in the eighth, Jones hit his sixth home run of the year, bringing in Hunter Morris in the process.
The game was tied 7-7 in the bottom of the 11th when sophomore second baseman Justin Hargett hit a solo game-winning home run.
Pitcher Bradley Hendrix (6-2) earned the win out of the bullpen.
The Tigers travel to South Carolina tomorrow for a three-game series against the Gamecocks.
"We're at the halfway point," Pawlowski said. "We've got 30 conference games, and we're at 15 right now. We need to take the 15 we played, the positives and the negatives, and learn from that. It's not going to get any easier."
The team returns home Tuesday to face Samford.
"We need to get some confidence going and then jump right back into it," Pawlowski said.
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