BY NOAH GRIFFITH
FOR THE OBSERVER
AUBURN —
Auburn softball has the stars, and now it will be shooting for the moon this postseason.
With 39 wins last season, Auburn won its most games in a regular season since a 40-win 2018, but an early exit in the Clemson Regional left Auburn soul searching.
Maddie Penta went 24-10 and led the SEC with a 1.76 ERA; Bri Ellis won All-SEC Freshman of the Year and swiped the program freshman home run record with 20; but Auburn ran out of star power when it came down to the wire. However, 2022’s eight-player freshman class reset the standard and took home a better understanding of what it takes to get to dive deeper into the postseason after a season-ending, 4-3 loss to Louisiana.
“I think for us to get to where we want to go this year, which is obviously the World Series, we need to host a regional, and on top of that, we have every opportunity to win the SEC Tournament and be regular-season champs,” Ellis said in an interview in February.
At 37-15, and 13-8 in conference play, the Tigers are in position to do just that at No. 13 in the country.
Not only that, but they have a chance to mirror last season’s win total with a series win in their final regular-season series versus Mississippi State this weekend at home. Furthermore, with a sweep of the 27-22 Bulldogs, Auburn can match its 2018 regular season at 40 wins.
Looking for its first SEC Tournament win since 2019, Auburn will begin its postseason journey in Fayetteville, Arkansas, on May 9. It won’t do it blindly, like it did last season, however. Not only is head coach Mickey Dean at 200 career wins, his team has adjusted and muscled up to top-notch competition this time around.
Coming off of three consecutive series wins and five of seven SEC series wins this season, Auburn is displaying a matured version of the team that exploded onto the scene last year, when it took four total conference series’. This year, the Tigers won back-to-back series’ with No. 15 LSU and No. 14 Alabama, and it took extra inning-wins for No. 6 Georgia and No. 22 Florida to notch series wins over Auburn away from the Plains.
At third in the SEC, Auburn knows its identity and has built on star showings from last year. It has 77 wins and plenty of individual accolades to show for it, but Auburn needs to get some key contributions from its depth in order to fill in the gaps and avenge an early tournament exit last season.
Passing the Crown
In the circle, Penta is looking as close to an automatic win as there is, but one arm will only carry a team so far.
Somehow, the junior is putting her season where she set the program sophomore strikeout record in the shadows. She’s 23-5 with a 0.96 ERA and is second in the nation only to Alabama’s Montana Fouts with 261 strikeouts, eight shy of her 2022 total with three regular-season games remaining. She’s nonchalantly thrown two no-hitters this season with 14 complete-game efforts and now ranks fourth on the program’s all-time strikeout leaderboard.
But when she’s asked to pass the crown, the Tigers have struggled. They have lost the last five SEC games she hasn’t started, while Penta has won her last seven conference games – all complete games.
Behind the ace, Auburn has two other starters who boast ERAs under 3.00, sophomore Annabelle Widra and junior lefty Shelby Lowe, but both have been hit harder in conference play. They each have shown hints of success versus high-level competition, though.
Widra (8-4) picked up a win over Missouri, pitching 5.1 scoreless frames in relief of Lowe (5-5). On the other hand, Lowe got a win in relief in a nine-inning, walk-off win over LSU. Lowe also showed sharp stuff the day before that in a start against a lefty-filled LSU lineup, but a bloop and a blast by LSU’s only right-handed batter was enough damage to pin her with a tough loss.
Penta will continue to get the vast majority of the workload, but at some point, she needs to be able to hand the ball to a reliable supporting cast. Auburn needs another go-to arm outside of Penta if it is going to be a persist in a long tournament with short turnaround periods.
No Easy Outs
On the offensive side, Ellis has continued to build on her dominant rookie showing. She’s launched 12 “Bri Bombs,” leading the club in homers, RBI (38), total bases (83) and slugging percentage (.638).
Last year, however, Auburn’s lineup seemed to fizzle out toward the bottom of the order.
This year, the lineup has threats dispersed throughout. The first baseman is one of four batters hitting .300 or better, and only the leadoff batter, sophomore Nelia Peralta, comes before her.
Peralta leads the team in average (.346), OPS (1.108), hits (46) and walks (39) and has reached base multiple times in 30 games this season with 14 multi-hit contests. She has been an elite table-setter, but she is also tasked with driving in runs with last year’s average leader, senior Carlee McCondichie, batting .310 out of the nine spot despite recent struggles.
Adding to the mix, junior Makayla Packer is second on the team with a .321 batting average at seventh in the lineup. She adds consistent hitting but also leads starters with nine steals.
This is a trend that Auburn will need to continue, as well as keeping the bats of Denver Bryant and Icess Tresvick hot.
Auburn boasts plenty of star power, but to reach the moon and return to the College World Series for the first time since 2016, it will need to fill in the gaps.