AUBURN, Ala. – No. 9 Auburn jumped out to an early lead and held No. 3 LSU to its lowest hit total of the season, finishing off its first sweep of the Tigers since 1988 with a 3-2 win Sunday afternoon at Plainsman Park.
The series also marked Auburn’s first sweep against a top-five team since doing so against Florida from Mar. 17-19, 2017.
“For this weekend, our guys came together and played great, sound baseball in every facet,” head coach Butch Thompson said. “Our crowd, the largest series at home, it all just came together and synced up this weekend. I love to see them have a moment like this.
“There are many challenges to come and we’re only at the halfway point, but for a weekend, everybody got to see what the coaches and I see every day,” Thompson added. “How these guys continue to fight and hang together. They’re close, our dugout’s great, our locker room’s great. That’s the key to having hope, and they’ve been amazing with that.”
Leading 3-0 in the fifth inning, sophomore lefty Griffin Graves (3-1) took the mound with two runners in scoring position and nobody out but got out of the inning unscathed with a popup, and two strikeouts sandwiching a walk. His strikeouts came against LSU’s two and four-hole hitters.
“I was happy to go out there and compete, trusting my guys behind me,” Graves said. “I have a pretty good fastball, and we knew coming in that it would give them some fits if I was able to locate it well. Execution of the fastball and showing them an off-speed pitch every so often was enough because these guys hadn’t really seen a fastball that’s similar to mine. That was nice to trust my stuff and grind the outing out.”
Following Graves’ career-high 3.1 innings in relief, Dylan Watts made his second appearance of the week and earned his first save of the season as he recorded the last five outs. It marked the second game this week the junior righty finished as he also earned the win in the midweek at Georgia Tech.
“A lot of confidence for the staff,” Watts said. “I was excited to go and get a sweep. You don’t have to be perfect, but making the big pitches, that’s where it counts. Both those guys (Alvarez and Graves) got out of good jams. It’s really good to see for them and for the team.”
Auburn (26-10, 9-6 SEC) wasted no time getting on the scoreboard with two runs in the first. Chris Rembert drew a one-out walk before Ike Irish doubled off the War Eagle Wall in left field. Cooper McMurray then drove them both in with a double to a similar spot off the wall as Irish.
The home Tigers added a run on double play ball with runners on the corners and nobody out to make it 3-0 in the second, and that’s all the offensive output they would need as the pitching staff held LSU to two runs, matching the lowest run production of the season for the second straight day
“The pitching staff really stepped up,” Thompson said. “I want them to carry confidence moving forward about what they can do. These guys were super excited to play well in front of the home fans this weekend.”
Making his second straight SEC starts, Andreas Alvarez faced the minimum in the first two innings thanks in part to a double play, but LSU (31-6, 10-5 SEC) threatened with a pair of baserunners in both the third and fourth innings. However, the freshman righty buckled down in both innings to keep the visiting Tigers scoreless.
The visiting Tigers threatened again in the fifth, putting a pair aboard with nobody out to run Alvarez from the game before loading the bases with two outs. However, Graves blew a fastball by LSU five-hole hitter Daniel Dickinson to end the inning unscathed. Alvarez ultimately turned in 4.0 scoreless innings.
Graves faced the minimum in the sixth and seventh innings thanks to a caught stealing from Fralick and the second double play of the game.
LSU scored a pair of runs in the eighth on a walk and two hits, but Watts went back to work in the ninth and retired the LSU eighth, nine and one hitters in order to finish off the sweep.
Offensively, Irish, Bristol Carter and Chase Fralick collected multiple hits with McMurray drove in his seventh and eighth runs of the week.
Auburn hits the road for four games next week, starting with a midweek at Jacksonville State (21-15, 5-7 C-USA) Tuesday at 6 p.m. before a series at No. 2 Texas (29-5, 13-2 SEC).