What a day to be a fan of the Auburn Tigers, huh? This has to be one of the better combined days for Auburn baseball and softball in some time.
Carlson's Perfection
Softball took two games from two different Big Ten teams this morning beginning with the win over Illinois. We'll have more on that in the weekend recap, tomorrow. The big news, though, was Kaylee Carlson's game against Ohio State.
Sophomore pitcher Kaylee Carlson went into the game already having an amazing season. She has not been beaten, yet. Today, she had the best game of her career.
Carlson faced 18 Ohio State batters Saturday afternoon in Tampa, FL. All 18 of them returned to the dugout without reaching a base. Auburn wracked up 8 runs over the course of the game, with the last three coming in the Top of the 6th. That put the Tigers in run-rule territory going into the bottom half.
Carlson sat all three down and came away with only the second perfect game in the history of Auburn Softball. She didn't do it alone, though. She only struck out three batters. The Tigers played excellent defense to secure the historic win.
Carlson didn't have the only momentous achievement for the day, though. Kasey Cooper became only the second player in SEC history to have 250 hits and 250 RBIs in their career. She really is one of the greatest.
Baseball Takes First SEC Series
Meanwhile, back in Auburn, Auburn face #5 Florida with a chance to take the first SEC series of the season following last night's 14-3 shellacking of the Gators. More on that in tomorrow's weekend recap.
It was a pitcher's duel between Auburn's Casey Mize and Florida's Brady Singer. Both were backed up by great defense. Both got into situations with the bases juiced and either no outs or only one out, only to be saved by the players behind them.
Auburn got on the board first thanks to some bad work around the mound by Singer in the 3rd. He had two balks in a sequence of a few batters that resulted in Jonah Todd crossing the plate. They added another run in the fourth thanks to Luke Jarvis' RBI double that scored Jay Estes.
Florida got one back in the 7th when they managed to get a runner across the plate before the final out of an inning-ending double play. That was it, though. Casey Mize threw 8 strikeouts in a masterful 7-inning performance and Cole Lipscomb threw the final two innings to get the Tigers the upset series win and get SEC play started off right.
Softball goes for the tournament sweep tomorrow against LIU-Brooklyn. Baseball will go for the series sweep against the #5 Gators tomorrow afternoon at 1:00 pm Central. That would certainly be a huge start to the SEC schedule and a big-time momentum builder.
War Eagle! What a day!