Auburn baseball passed its first big test of the season, rallying to notch a come-from-behind win over No. 18 Iowa on Friday night in Jacksonville.

The No. 14 Tigers are taking part in the Jax College Baseball Classic. AU entered 4-0 with an Opening Weekend sweep of Eastern Kentucky and a midweek win over UAB. The Classic set up for a big test with games against No. 18 Iowa and No. 10 Virginia.

The Hawkeyes jumped out to an early lead, scoring 2 runs in the first two innings. It was a 3-1 Iowa lead entering the bottom of the 4th inning.

The AU bats started to get going in the 6th inning, when Christian Hall cut it to 3-2 with an RBI single to center, plating Irish. The big inning came in the 7th, when Mason Maners and Bobby Pierce homered to put 3 runs on the board, giving Auburn a 5-3 lead.

Hall added a big insurance run in the 8th with a towering blast to right center.

A sac fly extended the lead to 7-3. Iowa wasn’t rolling over for its last at-bat. The Hawkeyes cut it to 7-5 on a 2-out, 2-run hit by Sam Petersen in the top of the 9th. Auburn P Will Cannon recovered, though, closing it out with a grounder to short.

Cam Tilly picked up the win striking out 3 of his 7 batters faced over 2 innings without a run.

Auburn faces Wichita State on Saturday. First pitch is set for noon CT/1 p.m. ET, with the game streaming on D1Baseball.com.

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