So Auburn did what Auburn does during the Round of 64 last weekend, cruising to three consecutive wins and qualifying once again for a Super Regional. The Tigers, who now are 52-9, will play host to Arizona this weekend for a three-game series. A ticket to the Women's College World Series is on the line.
That could be a dandy since head coach Clint Myers coached at Arizona State and spent a lot of time battling Arizona coach Mike Candrea through the years. Myers is 10-11 against Candrea in all competitions, though Myers has the better team right now -- at least on paper. None of that will matter this weekend insofar as the Wildcats already have won on enemy turf this month (UA won at University of Tennessee last weekend) and accolades mean exactly zero this time of year. So what if Arizona lost 19 games this season?
We'll talk more about that as the week unfolds. For now, let's review how Auburn got here:
THE WEEKEND
(Not The Weeknd)
- Auburn def. Jacksonville State, 2-1
- Auburn def. USC Upstate, 6-1
- Auburn def. Jacksonville State, 14-2
WHAT WE SAW AND/OR LEARNED
- Jade Rhodes is difficult to read. She's streaky in general, but she was downright awful during the first two games last weekend. She broke out with an important double on Sunday, which keyed a six-run rally. Was that enough to get the senior back on track? It's worth noting that she really struggled during the 2015 postseason, so this may be how she operates. Rhodes was 1-for-8 this weekend. On the upside, she was good defensively.
- Rhodes needs to be better if Auburn is going to challenge for a title. She's a very popular player within the dugout and she represents the bridge between the Tigers' tried-and-true performers (Tiffany Howard, Emily Carosone, Kasey. Cooper, Carlee Wallace) and the back end of the batting order, which struggles to hit the ball at all. If Rhodes is on, it makes a big difference.
- Carosone quipped Sunday that Auburn has become a pitching team. Her sentiment was heart-felt -- Walters and Carlson were absolutely huge last weekend -- but this team must be balanced. Carosone did her part by leading the team with a .556 average (5-for-9) while Cooper was 3-for-7 with five walks. Yet the rest of the team hit 11-for-60 (.183), which is just not good enough. Auburn endeavored to become a better pitching team during the offseason and made a lot of progress to that end by signing Carlson and Martin. Still, this is a hitting team.
- Is Howard a proper power hitter now? I don't think it's a fluke. Both of her home runs were well-struck with a pretty, inside-out swing which clearly is repeatable. She's still very valuable as a lead-off slapper, but Auburn loves having someone like Howard who can adjust her role to what the team needs at that moment. Few players can do that as deftly as Howard. "She’s been working on it and working on it, and she’s done an outstanding job at doing exactly what she said – just getting the barrel on it and barreling the ball," Myers said. "That’s the definition of a home run, it is a byproduct of a good swing. Those two that she has hit have been great swings.”
- Madi Gipson is a good story; she has risen from unknown walk-on to the team's No. 7 hitter. Still, she's teaming with de facto shortstop Whitney Jordan to create a hole in the Tigers' batting order. Neither player accomplishes much against top-tier pitching and the emphasis right now simply is getting the bat on the ball rather than swinging through everything. Auburn can thrive without them, sure, but any production at 7 and 8 would make the batting order downright lethal.
- Assistant coach Corey Myers deserves a lot of credit. He's totally in charge of the pitching staff, which is performing admirably, but he's also playing a role with the hitters as well. Make no mistake: This team misses hitting coach Casey Myers, who left in January to take a job with the Padres. With that said, Corey Myers was a hitter in the minors (first-round pick of the Diamondbacks in 1999) and has learned a lot since his playing days in terms of how to mentor players.