Just when it looked like all hope was lost, Auburn’s bats finally came to life.
Matt Scheffler hit a two-run home run in the ninth to send the game into extra innings and Will Holland doubled home a run in the 11th to give AU a 5-4 win over LSU at Alex Box Stadium.
Auburn avoids the three-game sweep and finishes the regular season 32-23 overall and 14-16 in the SEC.
“These guys keep battling,” Auburn coach Butch Thompson told the Auburn Network. “Tanner’s got to come out again and he’s tight in his shoulder. (Cody) Greenhill goes five innings and we’re down two in the ninth and Scheffler hits a home run. Huge character win.
“You have to go out and earn it and to a man every single person contributed something to help us go out and earn it in Baton Rouge.”
Auburn had just four hits and scored two runs in the opening two games of the series before erupting for 10 hits including four for extra bases in game three.
Trailing 4-2 with one out in the ninth, Holland drew a walk and Scheffler drove an 0-2 pitch over the left field wall to tie the game 4-4, his second home run of the season.
Ryan Bliss led off the 11th with a single, stole second base and scored on a double down the left field line by Holland.
“It was a really intense game but we just tried to come out loose and have fun. I think this is the best team win we’ve had all year. We had a lot of guys step up and came out with us on top,” Holland told the Auburn Network. “Shows how much grit we have as a ball club. We’re never going to give up.”
A pair of Auburn High School graduates teamed up in extra innings on the mound. Ryan Watson (1-1) earned the win allowing just one hit over 1.1 innings and Brooks Fuller came on in the 11th to retire one batter and earn his first-career save.
“I think Ryan Watson has been looking for a moment like that for the better part of three years,” Thompson said. “Fuller, just right there at the toughest part. They’ve got their best guys at the plate.”
With a runner on second base and two outs, Fuller retired Antoine Duplantis, who has the third-most hits in SEC history, on a groundout to third base to end the game.
“He’s a great player but it’s really about not letting my guys down,” Fuller told the Auburn Network. “The last three or four weeks I’ve gone out there and laid some eggs and looked back and Will Holland and Ryan Bliss are on the field for 30 minutes at a time.
“They believed in me today, it was a big situation and I just tried to stay calm and throw strikes.”
AU starter Tanner Burns held LSU to a run on four hits but had to leave after the fourth due to tightness in his shoulder. Cody Greenhill threw a career-high 5.1 innings out of the bullpen allowing three runs, two earned, on six hits.
AU scored a run in the fifth on an RBI double by Steven Williams and another in the sixth on a solo home run by Bliss over the left field wall, the freshman’s second of the season.
Bliss was 2 of 5 with two runs scored and one RBI, Conor Davis 2 of 5, Scheffler 2 of 5 with a run scored and two RBI, Rankin Woley 2 of 5 with a run scored, Holland 1 of 4 with one run scored and one RBI and Williams 1 of 4 with one RBI
Auburn, the No. 8 seed, will play No. 9 seed Tennessee in the first round of the SEC Tournament Tuesday afternoon at 4:30 p.m. CT at the Hoover Met. The first round of the SECT is single elimination.
