The Auburn Tigers have not had a great start to the SEC portion of the baseball schedule. [autotag]Butch Thompson[/autotag]’s squad had just one victory in six tries against SEC opponents but the Tigers have continued to play good ball outside of the conference.
That trend continued on Tuesday with Auburn hanging a 13-spot on Jacksonville State in a 7-inning, mercy rule, win at Plainsman Park.
Things weren’t all sunshine and rainbows for the Tigers on an overcast evening on the Plains. Senior Christian Herberholz (1-1) started on the bump for the Tigers and was immediately met with turbulence. The senior surrendered a 2-run home run to Gamecocks infielder Caleb Johnson in the opening inning but was able to calm the storm from there, working through four total frames while allowing just one more run. He struck out 7.
Star catcher [autotag]Ike Irish[/autotag] was the first Tiger to pounce on Jacksonville State starter Colby Morse with a first inning solo shot. The sophomore now has 8 long balls on the campaign, leading all Tigers.
After things calmed down for the next couple innings, Jacksonville State infielder Brennen Norton drove home the final run of the day for the Gamecocks on an RBI double down the left field line to give JSU a 3-1 lead. From there, it was all Auburn.
Sophomore [autotag]Chris Stanfield[/autotag], senior [autotag]Mason Maners[/autotag], and junior [autotag]Cooper McMurray[/autotag] all provided run home runs around two more RBIs from Ike Irish in a 7-run fourth inning and 5-run fifth.
Auburn’s bullpen shut the door from there, giving the Tigers their fourth mercy rule win of the season. The 13 runs are the most Auburn has scored since March 10. [autotag]Butch Thompson[/autotag] will hope his teams’ bats stay hot with a tough road series against No. 4 ranked Texas A&M on the docket this weekend.
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