AUBURN | Elliott Anderson and Cody Greenhill have struggled when asked to pitch twice during a weekend series, so they won’t be asked to do that anymore.

Anderson will move from the bullpen to a starting role for this weekend’s final conference series at No. 20 LSU. And instead of being Auburn’s closer, Greenhill will be used in a longer relief role just once during a series, probably to follow Anderson Thursday night.

“We feel like Greenhill, we might extend him because we think the one outing may be better than the two from the track record of the season,” Auburn coach Butch Thompson said. “If we start believing we’re going to extend him and allow him to throw 3-5 innings, then we feel like we can almost move Elliott out of that role there.

“Just to try to match where we think our staff is currently heading into this last weekend is all we’re trying to do.”

Greenhill and Anderson have thrown twice in seven weekend series. Anderson has a 3-0 record with a 0.00 ERA and six hits in 9.0 innings in the first game, and is 0-0 with a 6.23 ERA and 19 hits 13.0 innings in the second. Greenhill is 0-0 with six saves, a 0.00 ERA and one hit in 10.1 innings in the first game, and 1-2 with one save, a 5.02 ERA and 21 hits in 14.1 innings in the second.

Thompson said Bailey Horn and Ryan Watson are two possibilities to close out games. Greenhill leads the team with nine saves, Skipper Carson has two and Brooks Fuller one.

Auburn enters the series 31-21 overall, 13-14 in the SEC and No. 20 in the NCAA RPI. Fourteen conference wins and a top 30 RPI ranking are usually enough to qualify for an NCAA Regional so winning at least one game this weekend is important, but Thompson wants more from his club.

“I think we need to win the series,” he said. “I know that walking out today we had the No. 1 strength of schedule in America. Once we’ve finished playing LSU that’ll be 23 games against top 25 RPI opponents.

"We’ve just got to go play as hard as we can for three games and see where we’re at when we wake up. There’s no doubt we can build a narrative for Auburn baseball this year with how many games we’ve played against top 10, top 25 RPI teams.”

Outfielder Kason Howell hyperextended his knee in Saturday’s doubleheader against Georgia and missed Tuesday’s game against North Alabama. He will travel with the team to LSU and could be well enough to play Thursday night.

LSU is 32-12 overall, 15-12 in the SEC and No. 21 in NCAA RPI. LSU is 7th in the conference with a .271 batting average, 7th with 349 runs scored, 12th with a 4.92 ERA and 5th with a .978 fielding percentage. LSU is 25-7 at Alex Box Stadium.

“They’re swinging the bats better, especially at home,” Thompson said. “We’ll need our guys to throw very well. I think Elliott can get us off to a good start. I think we’re going to see five or six left-handed batters.”

Game times for the series are 6:30 p.m. CT Thursday, 7 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. Saturday. All three games will be carried on SECN+.