It was an ugly opening night for Auburn in Nashville.

The 21st-ranked Tigers allowed five unearned runs, lost starting pitcher Tanner Burns in the third inning after a visit from the trainer and head coach Butch Thompson was ejected during a 47-minute rain delay in a 12-6 loss to No. 3 Vanderbilt Thursday night.

“I wasn’t going to go through every mistake we made tonight — there was enough to go around pitching, offensively and especially defensively — but we have two more games and that was really my message,” assistant coach Gabe Gross told the Auburn Network. “We came out and laid an egg for the most part tonight. Now we competed but didn’t do near enough on a skill level to come close to winning an SEC baseball game.

“But we’ve got two more games, we’ve got to get rid of this and come back and get ready to compete for nine innings tomorrow.”

Burns (4-3) took the loss allowing five runs, three earned, on four hits and four walks in 2.1 innings. He pitched during a driving rainstorm through much of the second and third innings before signaling to the bench with one out in the third.

“I know he was starting to feel some tightness and I think it was precautionary. How precautionary or if there’s something really going on, I don’t know yet,” Gross said.

Elliott Anderson allowed five runs, three earned, in 3.0 innings, Carson Skipper two runs, one earned, in 1.1 innings and Will Morrison just one hit in 1.1 innings.

The Tigers committed three errors, issued nine walks, threw four wild pitches, had a balk and hit a batter.

Judd Ward led Auburn with three hits including two doubles. He scored two runs and drove home one. Matt Scheffler was 2 of 5 with two RBI and Ryan Bliss 1 of 5 with two RBI. Will Holland hit a solo home run, his fourth of the season, in the sixth inning.

The Commodores opened up a 7-0 lead after three innings, AU closed to within 7-5 in the sixth before VU closed the game with five unanswered runs.

Auburn falls to 27-15 overall and 10-9 in the SEC while Vanderbilt improves to 32-9 and 13-6.

The series will continue Friday at 7 p.m. CT on SEC Network and conclude Saturday at 1 p.m. on SECN+.