Mize fans 15 in 4-1 win
AUBURN | It was another dominating performance by Casey Mize.
The Auburn right-hander tied a school record with 15 strikeouts to lead the 20th-ranked Tigers to a 4-1 win over No. 17 Vanderbilt Friday night at Plainsman Park.
Auburn improves to 32-14 overall and 11-11 in the SEC while the Commodores fall to 25-20 and 11-11.
“He gets a lot of praise and credit, but I think we all agree it’s well deserved,” Auburn coach Butch Thompson said. “Special, special night — 15 strikeouts and no walks. He just shoves the ball in the strike zone.”
Mize (9-2) earned the win with his third complete game of the season. The All-American allowed just one run on four hits with no walks on 110 pitches. Vanderbilt’s lone run of the game came from Philip Clarke, who hit Mize’s first pitch of the seventh inning well over the right field wall.
Mize got the last laugh, however, striking out Clarke in the ninth to earn the record and end the game. He joins Chris Bootcheck, Tim Hudson, John Powell and Mark Chapman in Auburn’s record book with his 15 strikeouts.
“That’s four really special pitching names in the history of our program and Casey matched that and deserved to,” Thompson said. “Those four men are special pitchers in our program and I think Casey goes in that category of one of our special pitchers of all time.”
Mize’s ERA fell from 2.40 to 2.25 and he now has 119 strikeouts and just seven walks this season.
“To be in the company of those guys is pretty awesome,” Mize said. “I wasn’t thinking about any record or anything like that but I’m glad it worked out that way.”
All of Auburn’s runs also came via the long ball. Brett Wright hit a solo home run over the left field wall in the first inning and Conor Davis, starting for the first time since April 24, hit a three-run blast over the centerfield wall in the fifth.
“We got two big swings in the game,” Thompson said. “Brett Wright with the solo home run in the first with two outs and nobody on, I thought was huge.
“Conor has been swinging that bat so good this week. It looks like he started turning on the baseball the way he did back in the fall.”
Jay Estes and Brendan Venter hit back-to-back one-out singles in the fifth before Davis hit just his second-career home run. His first was a three-run shot that gave Auburn a walk-off win over South Carolina on April 2 of last season.
“I kind of forgot what it felt like to do that,” Davis joked. “After my first at-bat, he kind of made me look like not a very good hitter. I just was waiting on a mistake pitch and trying to jump on a fastball and he left a slider up.”
Estes had two of Auburn’s six hits.
Drake Fellows (4-4) took the loss for Vanderbilt allowing four runs on four hits in 6.0 innings. He struck out five and issued one walk.
The series continues Saturday at 2 p.m. CT and concludes Sunday at 1 p.m. Both games are available on SECN+ and WatchESPN.