AUBURN, Ala. — Kayla Kowalik registered a hit in her school-record tying 18th game Friday night, but Auburn took the series opener vs. No. 12 Kentucky with a four-run first inning, 5-3.
Game two of the series will be Saturday at Noon ET and broadcast live on the SEC Network with Mark Neely and former Alabama All-American Kayla Braud on the call.
Kowalik went 3-for-4 at the plate on Friday night, with three singles as she bumped her incredible season-long batting average up to .522. The hit in the top of the first marked the 18th-straight game Kowalik has recorded a hit, tying Katie Reed’s school record in 2016. She joins Reed and Kara Dill as the only three UK players to have a 15-plus hitting streak in program history.
In the first, Kowalik scored on an RBI infield single by Lauren Johnson to break Brittany Cervantes’ runs scored record, as she tapped the plate for the 57th time this season.
Kentucky mounted a scoring threat in the top of the fifth inning, and had runners at second and third with no outs down two runs, but UK was unable to crack the code and left the bases loaded in the inning as part of a game that saw UK leave four runners on base in scoring position.
Auburn won the game in the bottom of the first, as a UK error and a three-run home run put up a four spot for the Tigers in the inning, a deficit Kentucky couldn’t climb out of.
UK falls to 29-9 on the season and 5-8 in the Southeastern Conference.
