No. 14 Auburn splits doubleheader vs. UConn

Courtesy of Auburn Athletics

AUBURN, Ala. – No. 14 Auburn split Saturday’s doubleheader vs. UConn, winning game one 8-1 before falling 8-4 in game two at Plainsman Park.

“I thought it was the best game we played all year in the first game,” head coach Butch Thompson said. “It was clean on the mound. Our at-bats were good throughout the ballgame. Defensively we were good. Just all the way around I thought it was our best game.

“Then I thought we followed that up 45 minutes later with our worst half inning that we’ve had all year,” Thompson added. “But we got a bunch of guys in two games, and I thought they kept playing. We chased a non-competitive top of the first the entire ballgame and still had a chance.”

Offensively, Auburn (8-2) continued its season-opening streak of games with a home run with four on the day and has now homered in 10 straight games to start the season. Ike Irish collected a team-high three hits in the doubleheader and reached the 100-hit milestone in just his 68th career game played.

On the mound, Chase Allsup (1-0, 4.50) earned the win in the opening game, throwing a season-high 6.0 innings with a season high six strikeouts. Allsup allowed a run in the first inning of the day but held the Huskies at bay in his final five frames.

“The first couple of innings were sporadic, but I felt like as time went on, I found the slider again and was able to fill up the zone with more than one pitch.”

“I loved how Chase finished the game. I thought he was getting better. I just liked how he finished strong,” Thompson added. “I do want them coming out on the attack, and I thought that’s what Chase did. I thought he settled and we saw some growth with him.”

Seventeen position players and seven pitchers ultimately saw action in a game Saturday.

GAME ONE

The two teams traded runs in the first inning with UConn scoring on a solo homer and Auburn manufacturing a run on a hit batter, walk, double steal and groundout to second. After throwing out a runner at third to end the top of the first, Bobby Peirce got the job done with the RBI groundout in the bottom of the frame.

UConn threatened by putting a runner on third with nobody out in the second, but Allsup buckled down and escaped the inning unscathed with back-to-back strikeouts and a flyout to center. Allsup ultimately allowed just the one run on six hits with two walks and a season-high six strikeouts.

After drawing a walk, stealing two bases and scoring a run in the first, Cooper Weiss hit a solo homer to start the bottom of the third inning and give Auburn the lead. The home run was Weiss’ first in an Auburn uniform.

Two innings later, Wiess also accounted for an Auburn run with a sacrifice fly after Javon Hernandez started the inning with a triple to left center. Later in the frame, Peirce hit a two-run homer off the scoreboard to make it a 5-1 game. The home run was Peirce’s fourth of the season, including his third in the last five games.

Maners hit a two-RBI single back up the middle to extend the lead to six in the eighth, marking his third hit of the game, and Weiss capped off the scoring in the contest with a RBI single to right.

John Armstrong allowed just two baserunners on a walk and error in the final 3.0 innings and earned the save.

GAME TWO

After being held scoreless in the final eight innings of game one, UConn scored six runs on four hits, including a two-run homer, in the first inning of game two.

Auburn answered with three runs of its own in the bottom of the first. Irish’s 100^th career hit was a solo homer to left field to start the scoring. The sophomore joined an elite list of Auburn players by reaching the milestone in just his 68th game played.  After Peirce doubled, Cooper McMurray launched his fourth homer of the season on top of the hitting facility in right field.

The Huskies continued to score in the early going with a run on a RBI single in the second and solo homer in the third, but the Tigers bullpen duo of Christian Herberholz and Tanner Bauman held the visitors scoreless in the fourth through seventh frames with five strikeouts apiece.

Trailing 8-3, Auburn threatened with the bases loaded and one out in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings, but managed just one run on a bases-loaded walk from McMurray in the eighth. Chris Stanfield hit a line drive to third with two outs in the seventh, but it was snared and erased a potential bases-clearing double.

Parker Carlson and Hayden Murphy turned in scoreless innings with a strikeout apiece in the eighth and ninth.

The series finale between the two teams is set for Sunday at 1 p.m. CT at Plainsman Park.