AUBURN, Ala. – No. 6 Auburn jumped out to an early lead and answered two of the three times No. 9 Oklahoma scored in a 6-4 win in the series opener Friday night at Plainsman Park.
“Every time they scored, to our credit, up and down the lineup was competitive and we answered back,” head coach Butch Thompson said. “Until we got the last out, it felt like they kept coming. I tip my hat to those guys. This is going to be a tough series. We’ve got to keep playing with confidence as an offense, defense and pitching staff to have any chance coming out here tomorrow.”
The series-opening win marked Auburn’s 10th straight in league openers at Plainsman Park dating back to the 2024 season.
Andreas Alvarez (7-2) earned his team-best seventh win of the season as he held Oklahoma to three runs on five hits with six strikeouts and one walk in 6.2 innings pitched.
“I was able to land the cutter and curveball for strikes,” Alvarez said of what was working in his outing. “I got the changeup going too and was able to give my fastball a little extra length.”
“’Dre getting 6.2 innings was humongous for us,” Thompson added. “He really got his stuff set in the fifth and sixth innings. Those last two innings were the best for ‘Dre.”
Eric Guevara accounted for one of Auburn’s three home runs, marking the sixth time in the last seven games the Tigers hit multiple homers. Guevara finished with a game-high three hits and drove in three.
“It rattles any pitcher to have good at-bats and hit the ball hard. We’ve been hitting the ball really hard and finally we’ve gotten some height on the ball,” Guevara said. “I hit a couple fastballs pretty hard the first two at-bats so I was expecting something softer. I was ready to get my good swing off.”
Auburn (29-12, 11-8 SEC) wasted no time in starting the scoring as Mason McCraine hit the first leadoff home run of the season, and Chase Fralick followed two batters later with a solo homer to left field. The reigning SEC Freshman of the Week, McCraine’s home run was his fourth in the last three conference games.
With one on and two outs in the bottom of the second, Bristol Carter broke from first base on a pitch, and Guevara extended his hitting streak to 17 games with a single back up the middle that scored his teammate all the way from first to make it a 3-0 game.
Nine of Auburn’s first 14 batters reached in the first two innings and the Tigers came away with three runs but stranded the bases loaded on both occasions.
Oklahoma (28-13, 10-9 SEC) got on the scoreboard with back-to-back one-out doubles in the fourth and made it a one-run game with a two-out single later in the frame.
Auburn answered immediately as McCraine drew a leadoff walk in the fourth to end Oklahoma starter LJ Mercurius’ outing, and Guevara hammered the second pitch offer by reliever Mason Bixby 416 feet to the left of the batters’ eye for his ninth home run of the season and second in as many games this week.
A two-out walk in the seventh ended a streak of six straight batters retired and Alvarez’s outing and ultimately scored after back-to-back singles to cut Oklahoma’s deficit to 5-3.
Auburn answered for the second time in the game as Bub Terrell and Ethin Bingaman started the bottom of the inning with singles and advanced on a sacrifice bunt before Terrell scored on a sacrifice fly from Brandon McCraine.
The Sooners scratched another two-out run on a single from Deiten LaChance in the eighth, his second of the game, but Jackson Sanders retired the last four batters he faced in the game to earn his second save of the season.
Game two between the Tigers and Sooners is set for Saturday at 6 p.m. CT.