BATON ROUGE, La. — Continuing a trend it started a week ago, Auburn scored six times in the sixth inning to turn a two-run deficit into a four-run lead as Auburn rallied and then held on to win, 8-7, at No. 21 LSU on Friday night.

The win was Auburn’s (19-14, 6-7 SEC) fourth straight in conference play and its second Friday night win in its last three trips to Alex Box Stadium, while the loss was the fourth straight for LSU (22-13, 3-10 SEC) in SEC play.

“It starts with the guy on the mound.” Auburn head coach John Pawlowski said. “What can you say about Zach Blatt? An outstanding effort, he got us deep into the game and made some big pitches. We were down 3-1, but our guys kept working and ended up finding a way to win today.”

The six-run sixth also gave Blatt (2-2) the win in his the first start of his career. The former Opelika standout, who has made 43 career relief appearances heading into Friday night, left after going a career-long 6 1/3 innings with AU up, 7-3.

“The first couple of innings I did not feel good,” Blatt said. “I couldn’t adjust to the mound and I had a hard time locating my fastball and my breaking ball wasn’t working the way I wanted it to work.

“By the third inning, my arm slot got a little lower and things started clicking and we got some hits there in the big six-run inning.”

Ethan Wallen earned his fifth save of the season by getting the final two outs of the game.

Auburn scored five times before LSU recorded an out in the sixth, using a double off the bat of Fradejas and back-to-back walks to Casey McElroy and Dan Gamache to load the bases. A Tony Caldwell two-run double tied the game at 3-3 and knocked LSU starter Kurt McCune (5-2) from the game.

Kevin Berry relieved McCune and hit Wes Gilmer to reload the bases before walking Kevin Patterson to put Auburn up, 4-3. A pinch-hit two-run single by Cullen Wacker made it 6-3 and put runners on the corners, which Auburn took advantage of with a suicide squeeze from Bobby Andrews with one out to give Auburn the four-run lead.

“We just had to find a way to get things going and get some momentum,” Pawlowski said. “We got some walks and got some big hits. Guys stepped up in clutch situations. You don’t have many opportunities against good teams or good pitchers but when you do you certainly have to take advantage of it.”

The two teams return to the diamond at 6:30 p.m. today for Game 2.