The No. 6 Tigers held off a No. 11 Mississippi State comeback in a 5-4 win on Friday night, knotting the series at one game apiece behind clutch hitting and resilient pitching performances.
“It wasn’t our cleanest game, but it was one of our best spirits,” Auburn head coach Butch Thompson said. “They’ve done that time and time again. I get to where I can’t see the way we’re going to do it, but (Andreas) Alvarez gets us off to good, competitive starts, and I think it’s as much of his spirit.”
Sophomore Andreas Alvarez got the starting nod for game two, having ceded his usual game one start to Jake Marciano after a lengthy 114-pitch outing against Texas A&M last weekend. The right-hander leads Auburn starters in both wins (8) and ERA (2.56) this season.
Sophomore right-hander Duke Stone took the mound for the Bulldogs, carrying six wins and a 4.24 ERA into Friday's matchup.
After a slow first inning for both offenses, Auburn got on top of multiple pitches in the second, with Chris Rembert and Ethin Bingaman each knocking singles to right field to put runners on first and third with no outs.
However, Stone took control of the strike zone and terminated the Tigers' momentum, striking out his next two batters before Bingaman was caught stealing to end the inning.
Auburn put the pressure on again in the third, loading the bases with a Lucas Steele walk, a Mason McCraine single and an Eric Guevara walk. This time, Chase Fralick was able to capitalize, hitting a fly ball deep enough to score Steele before Rembert singled to bring McCraine home and give the Tigers a 2-0 advantage after three.
Auburn extended its lead in the top of the fifth after putting two runners in scoring position. Rembert tallied his second RBI of the night with a groundout that brought McCraine home, and Bingaman knocked a ball through the infield to score Guevara, making it 4-0 Tigers.
That brought an end to Stone’s evening, who left the mound with 4 2/3 innings and 95 pitches under his belt, striking out seven while allowing four runs on seven hits and two walks.
Mississippi State broke through just half an inning later, as Reed Stallman cut Auburn’s lead in half with a two-run home run after getting ahold of a changeup over the plate.
That was Alvarez’s 97th and final pitch of the night, as he ceded the mound to left-handed pitcher Jackson Sanders. Alvarez’s final stat line consisted of 4 2/3 innings, six hits, two runs, two walks and seven strikeouts.
Sanders closed out the fifth and pitched a clean sixth before allowing a pair of baserunners to start the seventh. He punched out his next batter on three pitches, but couldn’t carry that momentum all the way through the inning, allowing an RBI single to Bryce Chance that cut Mississippi State’s deficit to one.
Sanders faltered again an inning later as his pitch count continued to rise, walking Kevin Milewski before Ace Reese drove him home with a single to right field.
Reese, a projected first-round pick in this year's MLB Draft, compiled four hits in the Bulldogs’ loss, increasing his season batting average to .327.
With the game tied for the first time since the third inning, Fralick stepped into the box to lead off the ninth with a hostile Starkville crowd behind him. Three pitches later, the star catcher connected with a sinker down in the zone and unleashed a home run to right-center field — his team-leading 13th long ball was the difference in Auburn’s 5-4 win.
“At the end of the day, it’s just me and (Fralick) out there competing. It’s the man in the arena," Sanders said after finishing the game in front of a crowd of over 13,000. “That’s what we’ve talked about all weekend. Just try to be the man in the arena. Don’t worry about who’s on the outside, but just compete and get it done.”
The series-deciding contest at Dudy Noble Field is scheduled for 3:00 p.m. CDT on Saturday, which will be Auburn’s final SEC road game of the regular season. Alex Petrovic will take the mound for the Tigers against sophomore righty Ryan McPherson for the Bulldogs.
With the regular season winding down, every win puts Auburn one step closer to hosting an NCAA Super Regional.
The Tigers have all but secured a slate of tournament games at Plainsman Park, but multiple wins between now and the end of next weekend’s series against Georgia would help secure a coveted top-eight seed.
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