No. 9 Auburn gave up the lead and then took it right back.
The Tigers scored a run in the seventh inning and three more in the eighth to rally from a two-run deficit and beat No. 15 Georgia Tech 9-8 Tuesday night at Russ Chandler Stadium.
“I think we’ve been through enough situations now with this team that whatever happens, I think we can settle and make pitches,” AU coach Butch Thompson told the Auburn Network.
“Three of the last four games, we’ve come out and played offense. And we needed those late. Even if we didn’t get it done in the middle innings, when they got the lead, we were still close enough to strike back.”
The Yellow Jackets scored six runs in the sixth to erase a 5-1 AU lead and go up 7-5.
Auburn cut it to 7-6 in the seventh on a two-out, RBI-single by Eric Guevara and put up a three-spot in the eighth on an RBI-double by Deric Fabian, and back-to-back RBI-singles by Bub Terrell and Ike Irish.
“We just didn’t blink and were able to hang in there and get some big swings off,” said Irish. “It’s a confidence booster knowing we can come back and win from behind. We’re figuring out ways to win. We still haven’t played our best baseball yet but if we keep finding ways to win, we’ll peak eventually.”
Dylan Watts (2-0) earned the win allowing a run on four hits over the final 3.1 innings. He had one strikeout and didn’t issue a walk.
"It meant a lot to me,” said Watts. “I feel like I’ve been throwing it a lot better helping the team win lately. I felt great for the guys, being so resilient. There’s no doubt in my mind they were going to come back and score some runs.”
Auburn, which improves to 23-10 on the season, struck for four runs in the first on a Cooper McMurray grand slam. AU added another run in the fifth on sacrifice fly by Guevara.
The Tigers had eight hits and drew 10 walks against eight GT pitchers. Terrell and Irish had two hits and one RBI apiece. McMurray was 1 of 3 with four RBI, Guevara 1 of 4 with two RBI and Fabian 1 of 4 with one RBI.
AU starter Christian Chatterton allowed just one run on two hits in 3.0 innings. He struck out two and issued one walk on 62 pitches. John Armstrong struck out two in a scoreless inning out of the bullpen.
Auburn, 6-6 in the SEC, hosts LSU for a three-game series this weekend beginning Friday night at 6 p.m. CT on SECN+/ESPN+.
