Auburn was unable to avoid the sweep against Arkansas, losing 2-0 on Saturday. The Tigers drop to 1-8 in SEC play with the loss.
Maddie Penta started on the mound for Auburn but was quickly worked into trouble by the Razorbacks, walking the first two batters. Arkansas’ Linnie Malkin ripped a single to right field, and a fielding error from Alyssa Rivera scored the first run.
In the second, Penta got into trouble again with two base hits and was quickly replaced by Shelby Lowe. Lowe finished the inning, and the game, finishing with no earned runs on three hits in 5.1 innings pitched.
The Tigers avoided pitching to Braxton Burnside, who has already set the school record for home runs this season. She was walked all four times at the plate, and three of them were intentional.
Arkansas’ second run came in the sixth after Justus Perry fielded a bunt and threw it off the baserunners helmet, trying to get the out at first. This allowed the other baserunner to get to third and score on a groundout one batter later.
“You gotta be clean against a top-10 team.” said head coach Mickey Dean. “It’s highly unlikely that you’ll beat a top-10 team with three [errors].”
Auburn’s bats were quiet all game. The Tigers struck out seven times and drew no walks on the day. Sydney Cox, Tyler King, and Makayla Packer were the only Tigers to log a hit.
Coach Dean believes that despite the result, his team was hitting well.
“I thought our swings were better today,” Dean said. “They played really good defense, but I did think our approach and our swings were much better in the first five innings.”
The Tigers will travel to College Station, Texas, next weekend to take on Texas A&M. The first game is set for 6 p.m. CST on Friday.
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Dylan Fox, Junior in Civil Site Design Engineering, joined The Plainsman as a sports writer in Spring 2020. From Geneva, IL.
