Auburn 2025 SEC Baseball Tournament Exit Interview

(Montgomery Advertiser photo)

SEC Tournament Results: L, 3-2 vs. Texas A&M

Record: 38-18

Auburn was one of the real wild cards coming into the season. Head coach Butch Thompson brought in a ton of great high school talent, and it felt like their season was dependent on how quickly those freshman adjusted.

While there were some growing pains, Chris Rembert, Chase Fralick, and Bub Terrell became instrumental parts of the lineup as freshmen. Rembert had a real argument to be named the SEC Freshman of the Year, hitting .355 with 13 doubles and 10 home runs.

Of course, it’s easier to break in those young guns when you have one of the best all-around hitters in the country bolstering your lineup in Ike Irish. The likely first-round pick hit .354 with 10 doubles, 16 home runs, and 52 RBI in 49 games.

Irish and veteran Cooper McMurray were a big part of Auburn being a top five offense in the SEC all year.

While many believed the offense would be able to score runs this year, there remained questions about the pitching staff.

Enter Samuel Dutton.

The LSU transfer became one of the best stories in the SEC this year as he took over the Friday night role and earned 2nd Team All-SEC honors by posting a 3.58 ERA in 75.1 innings with 89 strikeouts.

Auburn’s staff finished 11th in the SEC with a 4.80 ERA to go along with a 3.43 BB/9, 9.92 K/9, and .248 average against.

What’s next

Auburn is a lock to host a regional, and despite going one-and-done in the SEC Tournament, they still have a solid chance to be a top-eight national seed with an RPI of 4.

A couple of keys for Auburn in the postseason will be how the freshman handle the bright lights, and does Butch Thompson have enough arms he can trust.

Carson Myers has been great out of the bullpen all year, but how many innings can you get from him over a weekend?

They’ll need guys like Christian Chatterton, Cam Tilly, and Ryan Hetzler to give them some big innings in order to reach Omaha.

Auburn head coach Butch Thompson on getting ready for the postseason:

"Yeah, I've been tickled to death with them. Like I said, I want to play as many games as I can with this team because they've earned it. They've earned my respect, our coaches' respect, hopefully, most of our fans' respect, that we want to see them play ball and we want to see them play well.

I think that would be three out of four years hosting. I don't know how many teams in America have done that. I'm proud of some of these guys that have been here for a couple of those, McMurray, Irish to name a couple. So that's a huge step to be able to do that.

We haven't done that in our program's history. But at the same time, you want to make hay when you get those opportunities. I feel comfortable enough that these guys will absolutely put in a good week of work for us and be ready to go."

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