The winning streak continues.
Auburn defeated UAB 13-5 on Tuesday night after erasing a four-run deficit to secure its 14th consecutive win.
The 14-game stretch is tied for the fifth longest winning streak in program history.
The turning point of the game came in the fifth inning when Auburn scored eight runs on five hits. Three of the runs came from an RBI fielder’s choice from Matt Scheffler, a single by Will Holland and a wild pitch. Rankin Woley hit a single to score the tying run.
Conor Davis hit a grand slam the fifth-inning surge, the first of the season for the Tigers, giving Auburn the final 8-4 lead.
"The eight-run inning was huge," said Auburn head coach Butch Thompson. "Our offense showed up, and the guys stayed steady. Rankin Woley, we’ve been talking to him about two-strike adjustment, and he just battled. He dropped a two-strike hit in to extend the inning, and then Conor Davis had the big blow after we got the first four in. All in all, the offense was great.”
The four runs driven in by Davis is a season-high output. Edouard Julien and Woley combined for multi-RBI days.
This was Julien’s third-straight game with multiple RBI. Ryan Bliss finished with a season-high three hits.
"We were just trying to string together some at-bats, get some more baserunners on," Davis said. "We were a little bit out of our swings early on, but in the fifth inning, Rankin had a big two-strike hit and that really kind of kick started us. Our approach at the plate and how we were handling ourselves changed.”
Auburn’s offense continued to chip away at the Blazers with a three-run sixth inning. The Tigers scored one run in both the seventh and eighth innings.
While the offensive surge in the fifth turned the game around, Bailey Horn’s pitching contributed to keeping the Tigers within striking distance going into the top of the fifth.
Horn came into the game in the bottom of the fourth with two runners on base and no outs. He retired three straight batters to keep the Blazers from tacking on any more runs to what was a 4-0 lead in UAB’s favor.
"It looked like some of his stuff returned," Thompson said of Horn. "He got a big strikeout as soon as he got into the game. He came in ready to pitch. We were down 4-0 with runners on second and third. If they score there, it gets tougher. They had an opportunity to really hang it on us, and Bailey Horn was the reason we got out of it."
Horn struck out two and allowed no hits or runs in three innings of work. He was awarded the win for the game, his first in an Auburn uniform.
Auburn travels to No. 4 Mississippi State this weekend for a three-game series. While the Tigers are 3-0 in SEC play, the Bulldogs are 2-1. The series is set to open with a 6 p.m. CST start on Friday.
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