Auburn (6-1) took on the University of Virginia Cavaliers (7-0) Sunday in a game that would take all nine innings to decide. The team was tied at one in the fourth inning when in the home half Manners drove in McMurray with two outs. That was Auburn’s last lead as in the fifth, sixth, and seventh the Cavaliers would score, taking the lead and not looking back as they would go on to win 6-4.
“Good effort by our guys. I thought we locked in and stayed in there” Head Coach Butch Thompson said, “our at-bats were just not quite as good and as timely as Virginia tonight.”
Neither starter made an eye-popping start as Auburn’s Carson Myers would go four and a third giving up three hits, three walks, and two runs both earned, while striking out two. Despite no eye-catching components to his stat line Myers kept the Tigers in the game in his four and a third. Meanwhile, the Cavaliers had Owen Coady on the bump for Sunday’s matchup. Coady went three and two-thirds giving up two runs one earned alongside four hits and two strikeouts.
Deric Fabian had a good day at the plate for Auburn as 3-4 with a home run. Manners, Irish, and Pierce were the only three Tigers to drive in a run against Virginia as Irish and Manners would record just one hit, and Pierce’s RBI came when he reached on a fielder's choice in the bottom of the seventh where also stole a base, his first of the year.
Griff O’Ferral, Virginia’s leadoff hitter, went 2-5 at the plate and he went on to come around both times and score, accounting for half of the Cavaliers' runs. Henry Ford, who led the Cavaliers in average coming into Sunday, failed to record a hit, an impressive feat for the Auburn pitching staff as he has emerged as one of the better offensive players in the country this year.
The nail in the coffin came in the eighth inning when Whalen whacked a ground-rule double in the left-center gap driving in Godbout for the Cavalier's fifth run of the day. Later in the inning, the Cavaliers would get their second insurance run when Whalen came around to score off of a Stephan single.
Auburn hit a very impressive .778 (7-9) to leadoff innings but left a total of nine runners on base. They could not quite use the spark from the leadoff hitters to string together hits and runs going 0-2 with the bases loaded, two at-bats they will certainly look back on when reviewing this game and their ability to sweep in Jacksonville.
Auburn will return home for a midweek single-game showdown with instate rivals Samford at Plainsman Park. The 6 pm first pitch will be streaming on SECN+ in conjunction with the Auburn Sports Network.
