This encore left plenty to be desired.

Following a dramatic, come-from-behind, 8-7, extra-inning victory Saturday at Plainsman Park, the Tigers, in Saturday’s regularly scheduled game, gave up more runs and lost by more than any team in the program’s 76-year history.

Florida 24, Auburn 2 capped Saturday’s de facto doubleheader and evened the three-game conference series in the ugliest of ways.

“It’s really tough to swallow,” second baseman and Game 1 hero Justin Hargett said, “especially getting beat that bad.”

As bad as it was, the good from Game 1 made the day an emotional wash.

Mere hours before sparsely used freshman Dan Gamache struck out looking to end the two-hour, 52-minute relentless Gators beating, Auburn was celebrating arguably its biggest win of the season.

“I told these guys that we have to keep it all in perspective,” coach John Pawlowski said. “You come back and win a big ballgame the first game and then the second game, it’s a 3-2 game after five innings.

“Then the wheels came off.”

The wheels came off in the fashion of 21 unanswered runs over the course of four innings.

And they came in all shapes and sizes.

Michael Hurst entered with the first two runs already in following a Josh Adams home run off Auburn starter Jon Luke Jacobs, no one on base and no one out. He faced four batters and didn’t record an out before Rus Harper ended the seven-run sixth inning.

Florida was two better in the seventh inning against Harper and Zach Blatt and added five more off Blatt in the ninth inning. Seven of the runs were unearned.

“Things just got out of hand,” Pawlowski said.

Auburn’s record keeping dates back to 1949, though the program has been around since 1933. The closest Auburn came to allowing that many runs was in a 23-22 loss to Huntingdon in 1983. The last time Auburn gave up 22 or more runs was in a 22-8 loss to the Gators in 2004.

“For me, a loss is a loss,” Pawlowski said. “The pitchers that pitched, they’ve got to re-tune and re-focus and get their confidence going again. But as a coach, if you win 1-0 or lose 1-0, a loss is a loss. Our guys have to put it behind them.”

Auburn’s day began on a much more pleasant note, as it scratched back from a 7-1 deficit before ultimately downing the Gators in 11 innings. Tornadic conditions Friday night prompted the game to be suspended in the fifth inning before it was picked up Saturday.

The Tigers used a Joseph Sanders solo-shot — technically his second of the game — and a Brian Fletcher two-run homer in their three-run sixth inning. Ben Jones tacked two more on in the eighth inning with a home run of his own. Sanders’ RBI double in the ninth scored Trent Mummey and sent the game to extra innings.

Bradley Hendrix kept the Gators off the board in the 10th and 11th before Hargett ended the game with his second walk-off homer of the season. His first came in the Tigers’ first game of the season against Elon.

“I’m just excited to come through for my team,” Hargett said. “I ain’t trying to do it. I just happened to put good swing on it and it happened to go out.”

The improbable win, followed by the unsightly loss, sets up today’s 1 p.m. rubber match at Plainsman Park. A win would put the Tigers above .500 at the halfway point of the conference schedule and mark the first series win over the Gators since 2003.

“The one thing about this team is that we’re going to compete,” Hargett said. “It don’t matter how bad we got beat today. We’re going to come out tomorrow and compete again.”

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