Takeaways from Auburn baseball's series opening victory against #3 Florida
Auburn baseball opened their series against #2 Florida with a 9-1 victory in Gainesville on Friday night. Here's what you need to know about the contest:
Auburn's offense chased Brandon Sproat early
This Florida rotation is intimidating on paper - Friday starter Brandon Sproat is projected to be a day one pick in this summer's MLB Draft, with Saturday starter Hurston Waldrop being a consensus first round pick and sophomore Joe Caglianone not only 3rd on the team in strikeouts, but also leading the country in homeruns with 17.
But even giants can be felled with the right approach.
Auburn found a tell, thanks to the advance scouting of Director of Player Development Aaron Everett and Director of Baseball Analytics Peyton Sower:
Brandon Sproat, when down 2-0, throws a fastball over ninety percent of the time.
Ike Irish homered on a 2-0 count in the 1st inning. Nate LaRue singled on a 2-0 count in the 2nd, and after Caden Green and Cole Foster drew walks in the 2nd, Ike Irish hit a two-out single on - what else, a 2-0 count? - to chase projected 1st round pick Brandon Sproat in the 2nd inning.
On a night when Sproat didn't have his secondaries, Auburn was able to able to force Sproat into fastball counts and made him pay.
Final line for Sproat: 1.1IP, 4H, 8R with 3BB and 2Ks on 50 pitches (27 strikes).
Will Cannon and Tanner Bauman were FANTASTIC
Auburn switched up their rotation for the weekend, moving closer Will Cannon and reliever John Armstrong to starting roles for Friday and Saturday in hopes of not getting into an early deficit.
For at least one night, it worked.
Cannon navigated through four innings, scattering five hits but allowing only one run to score, with three walks and two strikeouts. The former closer kept Florida off balance off game, mixing his fastball up in the zone with offspeed below the zone and occasional breaking pitches.
Cannon was particularly adept at navigating through traffic - Florida got four of the five leadoff hitters that Cannon faced on base, but Will left seven Florida runners stranded through his four innings of work.
Tanner Bauman came on with a runner on 2nd and no outs in the 5th and was even better - Florida didn't have back to back runners reach for 7+ innings and left eleven runners on base for the game, finishing with one run on six hits. The Gators left two on in the 3rd and the bases loaded in the fourth, but scored only one run combined through those two innings.
Ike Irish has found the power
The true freshman hit his 3rd homerun of the season in the 1st inning, his 3rd in the last four games, off of an 0-2 fastball from starter Brandon Sproat.
In the week since being moved from 1st base back to the DH role since Cooper McMurray returned from his ankle injury, Irish has found another gear in the power department.
Said Tigers head coach Butch Thompson, "Ike's bat comes to the top of head [...] We were looking middle-away from the right-handers - we do it other games too and it doesn't always work out, but we've been thinking about him (Sproat) for a few days now and it worked out. I thought we came in and executed the plan that we talked about tonight, in a much better fashion."
"They were just waiting for a moment and we kept making enough plays there to get to the finish line."
Bryson Ware gave Auburn insurance to leadoff the ninth with his 13th home run of the season, a solo shot to left up and over the berm. The senior leads the team in both homeruns (13) and RBIs (33), and finished the night 2-5 with 2 RBIs and two runs scored.
What's next?
Auburn goes for the series victory against Florida in game two of the series. First pitch on Saturday is at 5:30PM CT, and the broadcast is available on SEC Network+. The radio call, with Brad Law and Andy Burcham, is available locally on 93.9FM and online at AuburnTigers.com.
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