AUBURN | Coming off a dramatic opening series win over Vanderbilt, No. 16 Auburn will hit the road this weekend for seven straight games starting at No. 24 Kentucky.
The road trip continues with a midweek game against South Alabama in Montgomery and a three-game series at No. 4 Georgia next weekend.
“These two weekends in a row are going to test the mettle of our ball club,” said AU coach Butch Thompson. “We just need to focus on Kentucky. This is a team that’s going to do a ton offensively.
“They’ve gotten after us recently. We have to go up and play good baseball and be prepared. I’m looking forward to the series.”
The Wildcats scored 26 runs, losing two of three at UGA last weekend. Offensively, UK is second in the SEC with 57 hit by pitches, first with 51 stolen bases and 15 sacrifice flies, and have the second-fewest strikeouts with 119.
UK is 12th with a .290 batting average and 10th with a 3.59 team ERA.
“The standard doesn’t change,” said AU pitcher Carson Myers. “We have to go there and win the series. That’s the expectation. We have to keep our heads down and keep going. We have momentum going into the weekend. These guys got us last year and we’re not going to let that happen again.”
UK swept Auburn at Plainsman Park last season as part of the Tigers 2-18 start in the league.
Game times for the series at Kentucky Pride Park are 5:30 p.m. CT Friday, 1 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. Sunday. Friday and Saturday’s games will be available on SECN+/ESPN+, and Sunday’s on SEC Network.
EARLY RETURN: Ike Irish was expected to miss the opening two weekends of conference play after fracturing his scapula on a hit by pitch against Old Dominion March 9. But the junior All-American was able to participate in practice Thursday night and is part of AU's 30-man roster for the UK series. He's likely to be restricted to the outfield, DH or pinch hitter this weekend. Irish was listed as questionable on the SEC availability report Thursday.
NO CHANGES: Auburn will go with the same starting rotation this weekend with Sr. RHP Samuel Dutton (3-1, 1.63 ERA) Friday, Jr. LHP Cade Fisher (0-0, 6.75) Saturday and Fr. RHP Christian Chatterton (2-0, 4.18) Sunday. Fisher has struggled returning from a back injury, allowing six runs in his last three starts, which totaled 6.0 innings.
“As long as we’re having competitive success I don’t want to change things,” said Thompson. “We had two quality starts last week, two out of four. Can we improve on that? That’s the goal. I think we’re going to keep after it and hopefully that improvement starts to show up.”
MR. 300: Thompson won his 300th game at Auburn with Tuesday’s 13-9 defeat of Alabama State. Thompson has led AU to two College World Series, five Regionals and three Super Regionals in his 10th year at the helm. He’s had 42 players taken in the MLB Draft during his tenure including 20 in the top 10 rounds.
“After being an assistant for 23 years, that was not my goal to start knocking out these milestones,” said Thompson. “A lot of support, a lot of staff, a lot of fans, a lot of players — everybody has been amazing to us. Hope everybody feels a part of that that’s been with us on this journey.”
LEXINGTON INVASION: Auburn’s baseball team will be playing at Kentucky as its No. 1 overall seed basketball team plays in the Lexington Regional. Auburn beat Alabama State 83-63 Thursday and will play Creighton Saturday at 6:10 p.m. in the second round.
“I can’t remember this happening before,” said Thompson. “Hopefully, some of those fans will find a way to root for both teams this weekend. That seems pretty special to me.”
BEST BUDS: Thompson and UK coach Nick Mingione have remained close friends after spending seven years together as assistants at Mississippi State under current Auburn AD John Cohen. “We’ll let these two teams get after each other,” said Thompson. “It won’t be nothing to do with us. I want us to play great this weekend, but I can’t gloss over the sincere friendship we have.”
