AUBURN, Ala.—Florida's offense looked improved early, but it wasn't enough in the end as Auburn won 6-5 on an errant throw in the ninth that allowed the winning run to score.
 
Florida (13-8, 0-3 SEC) had a 4-1 lead in the top of the third, but Auburn (17-5, 3-0 SEC) tied it up in the bottom of the third on three unearned runs. The Gators also had a 5-4 lead, but the Tigers tied it in the seventh and took home the win in the bottom of the ninth.
 
Auburn took an early 1-0 lead, getting a run on a pair of hits in the first inning off Florida starter Jackson Kowar. Jay Estes' fourth double of the weekend scored Bowen McGuffin from first for the first run of the game.
 
The Gators jumped on top with their best offensive inning of the series in the third. A leadoff single from Mike Rivera got it started and a double from Andrew Baker set UF up with a scoring opportunity. Dalton Guthrie was hit by a pitch to load the bases.
 
Jonathan India struck first, singling to left to bring home the tying run. After an Auburn pitching change, JJ Schwarz stroked a two-run single and Nelson Maldonado hit a sac fly to left for a 4-1 lead.
 
In the bottom half of the inning, Kowar got into another jam and appeared to escape before a costly error. After a walk loaded the bases with two outs, a high pop up to short was dropped by Christian Hicks that allowed two runs to score. A wild pitch then allowed the tying run to score from third.
 
Florida played small ball in the fifth to retake the lead. India led off with a double into the left field corner and Schwarz drew a walk to start the inning.
 
Maldonado bunted the runners over and Hicks' sac fly to right scored India from third for a 5-4 lead.
 
The Tigers took advantage of a leadoff triple in the seventh to tie the game, as Blake Logan scored on a sac fly from Jonah Todd to even the score at 5-5.
 
After the Gators went down in order in the top of the ninth, Auburn led off with back-to-back singles to set up a game-winning opportunity with the top of the order coming up.
 
Todd laid down a bunt back toward the pitcher Frank Rubio, who's throw to third got away and allowed the AU's J.J. Shaffer to come home for the winning run.
 
Florida will travel to Deland on Tuesday for a midweek contest at Stetson at 6:30 p.m. The game will air live on WatchESPN and on the Gators IMG Sports Network.
 
 
POSTGAME QUOTES
Head Coach Kevin O'Sullivan
"I think it boiled down to defense today, we scored four and I thought we swung the bat much better today. The sidearmer did a nice job for them. The bottom line is we had a double play ball that we should have turned a double play on, then we dropped a pop up. We know the ball is always going to be behind us and we just drifted on it for whatever reason. In the ninth, Logan did a nice job getting a base hit back up through the middle, didn't try to do too much. Frank went the wrong way on a bunt play, he should have went to the first base line because JJ's got to stay home. Then we made the errant throw to third base. I thought there was maybe some indecision there too, he should have hopped off the mound and anticipated going to third, could always reverse his feet and go to first. The bottom line is we just didn't do enough offensively in the middle innings and just shot ourselves in the foot defensively today, which is certainly uncharacteristic of us."
 
"I do think that we got better offensively this weekend, but it is a bit frustrating. We wanted to get out of here with one win which we weren't able to play good enough defense to do that."