Coffee and Magnolia: 27 April 2015

DIAMOND TIGERS

Wow. Talk about a big weekend! Both sets of Diamond Tigers swept their respective SEC series. Let's take a quick look back at it.

Baseball

Cole Lipscomb may not have felt like he had his best stuff going, but he was still dealing it well against UGA in the series opener on Thursday on the way to a 4-2 victory. Rather than leave any drama for Saturday's series finale, the Tigers decided to wrap up the series on Friday night with a 5-1 victory on the arms of Rocky McCord and Sam Gillikin. For the icing on the cake, the Tigers then completed the series sweep of the visiting Bulldogs on Saturday evening, 4-1.

That sweep, coupled with Alabama dropping their weekend series with Ole Miss puts the Tigers in very good shape on Tuco's layout of how the Tigers can make it into the post season. The Tigers will take their five game winning streak into a mid-week game against visiting Kennesaw State on Wednesday before traveling to Columbia, SC to face the Gamecocks in a weekend series.

Softball

The ladies completed the weekend sweep with their absolute destruction of the visiting Arkansas Razorbacks. The Hawgs never made it past the fifth inning against the Tigers thanks to walk off hits in the bottom of the fifth on both Friday and Saturday nights, and then Auburn taking an 8 run lead into the top of the fifth on Sunday afternoon before closing the series out. The Tigers won 9-1 on Friday night, 10-1 on Saturday, and finally 10-2 on Sunday. The Tigers also honored their three seniors on Sunday afternoon following the game.

The Tigers are only a half game behind Florida for the SEC's regular season title. They have one more series - against a very tough LSU squad - before the SEC Tournament begins the next week.

FOOTBALL

Now that spring practice is over with, we're into the off-season where everyone is wrapping up any spring stories and then getting heavily into prognostications. This morning's link dump is full of those.

Cameron Toney is trying to work his way into the rotation somewhere. If you watched A-Day, then you saw Toney doing some impressive work. Of course, the last two defensive MVPs of A-Day haven't exactly panned out during the season. Either due to injury or other reasons. Ryan Black discusses that very thing in another Ledger-Enquirer article, and how that probably won't be the case this season with Tray Matthews earning A-Day MVP honors.

Also from the Ledger-Enquirer, Guerry Cleggtalks about how Auburn has concerns just like every other team, but the quarterback position is definitely not one of them.

The Montgomery Advertiser features Chris Laye and his development as the only scholarship tight-end currently on the roster. That will change once Jalen Harris arrives, but for now Laye is it. I expect Auburn will be in a lot of heavy packages with Cox or Pettway this season to make up for the lack of TE depth unless Harris just proves to be a stud.

For a feel good story, there's the journey of Michael "Dirty Mike" Sherwood to go from walk-on to getting playing time in the defensive backfield. He made a lot of great plays during the A-Day game, as well.

Tucker Tuberville is enjoying his time at Auburn as he prepares to be a coach after graduating. I really hope we can get Tucker on the field late in one home game this season. I think he'd get a huge reaction from the fans if he was announced as entering the game.

Gus Malzahn has emphasized that the running back race is different this season from the past two seasons. Instead of a man-to-man battle, you have three people fighting for the top spot. Any of the three could turn out to be a stud at the position. I think Auburn's in great shape there.

Auburn cornerback coach Travaris Robinson is able to lean on his youth to relate to prospects on the recruiting trail for the Tigers.