On college baseball’s first Sunday of the 2019, the inconsistent weather that hovered over Plainsman Park — sometimes dreary and grey, sometimes bright and sunny — mirrored the baseball game taking place beneath it.
That was until Georgia Southern pitcher Tristan Roberts put Auburn’s second straight extra-innings game out of its misery.
Roberts walked Auburn freshman Kason Howell with the bases loaded in the 13th inning, scratching Edouard Julien across home for the game-winning run. The Tigers took the game, 4-3, along with the series Sunday afternoon at Plainsman Park.
Auburn’s Rankin Woley came aboard in the 13th with a leadoff single, followed by a walk by Julien, a fielder’s choice advancement by Conor Davis, a walk by Ryan Bliss and finally, the winning walk by Howell.
"Having a simple plan and staying within myself really helped," Howell said of the last at-bat. "It was little nerve-wracking, I’m not going to lie. But it turned out pretty good."
Howell was also called upon late in Saturday's Game 2 loss as he tied the game in the bottom of the ninth with an RBI single.
"He’s got good throws, very competitive," Thompson said of Howell. "He’s ready to strike, ambush… he wound up ready not to do too much on that last at-bat. Sometimes, the ability to take a walk tells you how locked in somebody is.”
After Georgia Southern grabbed an early 2-0 lead with a pair of unearned runs in the second, Auburn opened up its scoring in the bottom of the third when Will Holland’s RBI double — which stayed fair along the left field line by just inches after hopping off the third base bag — scored Judd Ward from first base.
The Tigers then went hitless for four more innings until the seventh when the 2018 freshman All-American Julien smacked the second pitch of the at-bat to the left-field wall. The ball bounced off the wall before bouncing off Georgia Southern leftfielder Noah Searcey’s head, allowing Julien to round the bases for the team’s first home run of the season — and their first inside-the-park homer since 2013 (Ryan Tella vs. College of Charleston).
As Plainsman Park pumped out Auburn’s signature “Rally Time” video in the bottom of the eighth, the Tigers responded. Everett Lau recorded a leadoff walk while pinch-hitting for catcher Chase Hall, sophomore Judd Ward sacrifice-bunted to move Lau to second, 2019 preseason All-American Will Holland was intentionally walked and 2018 freshman All-American Steven Williams came aboard with a walk.
The junior college transplant Woley then smacked in a bases-loaded single into right field to gift Auburn its first lead of the afternoon at 3-2.
Georgia Southern immediately responded, however. Jack Owen, Auburn’s fourth pitcher of the day, got the strikeout on Searcy, but reserve Auburn catcher Matt Scheffler dropped the pitch, allowing Jason Swan to take home from third base on a fielder’s choice, tying the game.
Auburn came up empty in the next frame with its 7-8-9 batters, sending the contest to extra innings.
Scheffler’s next mistake came in the 11th. What was officially recorded as a wild pitch from Owen looked like it simply wasn’t corralled by the catcher out of the dirt. That allowed the Eagles to load the bases with just one out, but Owen masterfully worked his way out of the jam with a strikeout and ground-out.
Georgia Southern had a shot to take the lead with a blooper into shallow right centerfield in the top of the 12th, but Williams made the catch of the day, laying out to make the grab and keep the score deadlocked. Holland’s defense also contributed to the late lockdown as his 6-4-3 double play, which he began throwing while falling down, kept the Eagles off the board.
A trio of Tigers made their Auburn pitching debuts in Kyle Gray, Bailey Horn and Richard Fitts. Gray, a redshirt junior from Austin, Texas, who spent the past two seasons at Blinn Junior College, got the Sunday start. He lasted just three innings after allowing the pair of unearned Georgia Southern runs in the top of the second inning.
For the game, Georgia Southern logged just one earned run in 13 innings.
Redshirt sophomore Bailey Horn, another Texan, missed last season after partial Tommy John surgery. He saw action for the first time in a Tigers uniform Sunday coming in relief of Gray in the fourth inning.
In the fifth, Horn worked out of a two-on, one-out jam after the Eagles’ Blake Anderson’s deep shot to left field to keep the lead at 2-1. Horn tallied 52 pitches before pulling pulled for freshman Richard Fitts in the top of the seventh inning.
Fitts manned the mound for the final three innings, allowing two hits and a walk during 2.1 scoreless innings of work. But after a crunch-time leadoff single by Georgia Southern’s Jason Swan, Thompson deployed the sophomore Owen.
In 4.2 innings of work, Owen, who was expected to be the starter this coming Tuesday against Alabama A&M racked up a game-high four strikeouts, no runs allowed and the win off 67 pitches.
"I feel like he would have gone out there another innings, two innings, if that’s what it would have taken," Thompson said of Owen.
Thompson added that he isn't sure who will start Tuesday in Owen's place.
"Until Cody Greenhill gets 100 percent, we’ve got some questions of who’s going to finish these things," Thompson said of sorting out the pitching lineups.
Auburn (2-1) returns to Plainsman Park on Tuesday to face Alabama A&M. First pitch is set for 4 p.m. CST on SEC Network Plus.
"I like our club," said Auburn head coach Butch Thompson. "Seeing our first weekend… I think we got two weekends worth of experience to draw from. It was a grind for our guys. If they can play quicker, more consistent with their energy, I think this weekend will be exactly what we designed it to be — a weekend to play razor-sharp with a ton of innings.
"I’m not ecstatic, though. We have a lot of work to do, a lot of structuring."
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Nathan King, senior in journalism with a minor in business, is The Plainsman's sports editor.
